Sin Eater
by Cuckoo on a String
Summary: He can't remember. She can't forget. Sometimes picture perfect doesn't mean it's a perfect picture. Nick Fury's secret Compendium is in jeopardy after the events of TWS, and when the sky is falling, the ugly stuff hits the fan. AoS cameos. Rated for language and violence.
1. 1

**Disclaimer: I own Hal. The rest belongs to older folks. **

.1.

She shouldn't have gotten up that morning. She certainly shouldn't have got to work. And she should never have taken this job.

Fury and his confidence be damned, nothing was worth this. But at least she wasn't in the tower when it fell. Or the hellicarriers.

No, because she was in downtown D.C., stuck in traffic. She needed to reach the Old Stone House in Rock Creek Park.

Her rendezvous point.

Sunbeams cut through the windows of her taxi, like long celestial You Are Here pointers.

Wow, she was paranoid. She bounced her knee, pressing her face against the glass to see down the avenue. Solid taillights as far as the eye could see. And things only got worse as people stepped out of their cars to snap pictures of the smoky sky, evidence of the aerial battle which had only just concluded.

Glancing away from the road, Hal let her eye wander over the storefronts to either side of the cab. Cameras winked back from each and every one. Dozens of unblinking eyes, just waiting to catch a glimpse of her face. Just because the building and ships were gone didn't mean the enemy was destroyed. Maybe SHIELD lost the battle. She knew so much, but she didn't have the answer to that question, even though she'd give anything to find out.

Fury sent the activation code five hours ago. So whatever he'd led them to believe, he wasn't dead. He still needed her. He'd need her more than ever after the fall of the Triskelion. All those files – lost.

She sure didn't have time to sit around waiting in traffic. It would get her killed, and nullify her purpose.

With a last scowl at the cameras, which she prayed no one was watching, she admitted defeat and fished a wad of cash out of her bag. She peeked at the meter. Fifty bucks should cover it. When had a cab trip downtown gotten so expensive? Right. Since always. This was why she took the bus.

"Hey." She held a trio of twenties in the cabbie's peripheral vision, hoping to buy his good graces – and his silence – with the extra ten. "Thanks for the lift. But I think I'll just hoof it from here."

The cabbie tentatively pinched the money, not pulling it from her fingers just yet, probably hoping for a longer trip and a higher meter. "You sure?"

"Yeah. Like I said, thanks." She let go of the money and scooted to the door as her driver put the bills away. For a second, as her hand settled on the handle, she reconsidered. Fury picked the park because there were so few cameras, and even with the tourists, the place was pretty well isolated. She was downtown. If anyone was looking, they'd see her. Sure thing.

Lesser of two evils, she supposed. Flushed with determination, she popped the door and stepped into the afternoon glare. She spared one last smile for the cabbie. "Have a good day."

"You, too."

She shut the door and moved on, dancing through a second lane of traffic to reach the sidewalk. A few trapped drivers honked, because they had nothing better to do, but the gridlock held, and no one moved so much as an inch as Hal wove her way to safety. Which would be better – speed or stealth? The metro would get her where she was going faster, but the city installed dozens of cameras in the subterranean tunnels. For public safety. Which was almost funny. Maybe the street would be safer. Of course, there would still be cameras on the street. She just wouldn't always know they were there. And she was exposed to satellite surveillance should her prognosticated hunters get really ambitious.

There just wasn't a good option.

Now, a real agent could find her way through this mess, Hal reasoned. Someone with skills, like Maria Hill, or the Black Widow. But Fury didn't hire her for her skills. In fact, he made sure she didn't have any, besides that one important quirk, before he took her on. Her normalcy was her defense.

Until they realized she wasn't normal.

No, she didn't know that. Not for sure. Whoever blew up SHIELD's headquarters had let her walk out of there less than four hours ago. They let her go home, shower, change – pretend everything was _normal_. But Fury was alive, and he was calling for his Compendium, so for all Hal knew, the entire organization was compromised. She hadn't hung around to find out. She'd watched the tower crumble on her television as she grabbed an extravagantly large purse – stuffed with two changes of clothes, scissors, hair dye, a couple fake ID's, a modest lump of cash, and contact information for some very powerful (really scary) people. This was why Fury brought her into the fold. This was her moment.

She just needed to trust Fury's plan and get where she was going. He'd take care of everything, just like he'd promised, and all his careful scheming would pay off.

The prying eyes didn't drive her off the main roads, but all the pedestrians gawping at the devastation with their cell phones raised on high made for resolute obstacles. She'd meant to just stay on this street until she reached the next metro station, it was just down a few blocks – what _normal_ people would do in the given situation – but she'd fallen behind schedule thanks to the traffic, and she didn't know what Fury would do if she showed up late. The man had an amazing gift for creative punishments when he started worrying.

A detour it was, then.

Hal glanced around to check her bearings, then turned off the main road. D.C.'s side streets weren't friendly territory by any means, and Hal smelled enough tension in the air to make her worry about a riot. One could never predict how people would react to a disaster. That was what made them so dangerous. Luckily, most of the other pedestrians had moved to the wider streets and boulevards to better see the smoke from the hellicarriers. She almost had the street to herself.

After another block, she had to turn again, and she eyed the alley she meant to use warily. Wasn't this the kind of place girls got set upon by rapists in the movies? Muggers purported loved these little niches. If she took the chance, though, she could shave at least ten minutes off her travel time. Otherwise, she'd have to round the block and head back south to reach the nearest station. Well, there was her answer. She didn't have time for that.

She spared one glance over her shoulder, to ensure no one had followed her (like she would know if they had), and plunged into the shady lane.

Five steps in, the hairs on the back of her neck rose. She did her best to ignore them, but found herself picking up the pace. She chanced a peek over her shoulder. No one there. Halfway along, and she knew she'd made a mistake. She could just _feel_ eyes tracking her, but no matter how many times she glanced back, she saw no one. Promising herself that it was the last time, and struggling to not sprint the rest of the way, she looked back. Nothing there. She kept going, and looked forward.

A man stood in the alley, blocking her way.

He had a metal arm.

Bits and pieces of information and rumor rose unbidden from the back of her mind, and Hal drew a hazy impression of someone with a Bad Reputation. A dangerous man. As if the scowl and the metal arm weren't hint enough.

The Winter Soldier

And yet, his face drew a rush of data completely unrelated to the star-marked arm. A different soldier. A hero. Long dead, fondly remembered.

She shook her head and retreated two quick steps, one behind the other. The soldier with two profiles followed, advancing two brisk paces to match her. While the man in the second profile nearly always wore a smile, and the first had no face, this man followed with a stone-cold scowl. His intent was clear, sliced clean and clear from any emotion. What remained seemed a bit… bored, really. Maybe even irritated. An assignment like this must be below his usual pay grade.

Was she the assignment?

With a _whoosh_ that thundered in her ears, her heartbeat spiked. Adrenaline trembled in her fingers, and she clutched her bag closer, torn between using it as a shield or ditching it in the name of speed. Speed was the better option. A couple of shirts and some old canvas would do nothing to stop that metal hand from tearing into her. But what good was running? How far could she get before he caught up and made sure she never ran anywhere ever again?

What would Director Fury think when she never came to the rendezvous point?

"Give me the Compendium."

The Soldier waited for her to answer, but Hal could only just remember how to stand upright, and her stuttering breath would've made speaking difficult, anyway. After a few long moments, the Soldier ceded to her silence and took a step forward. That faintest of threats restored her powers of speech.

"Bucky Barnes."

The Soldier stopped in his tracks, and the frost in his eyes cracked – just a fraction, but enough to reveal a trace of fear beneath the cold. "How do you know that name?"

Although the Soldier's eyes never left hers, Hal found herself looking anywhere else rather than meet his gaze. She put it down to checking for escape routes, but the truth was that she'd never been so frightened in her life. Where were all those awful cameras now? Wasn't there anyone to look out for her? Didn't anyone notice her duck down this alley? The Soldier began to advance again, and the words came pouring out.

"Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes, member of the Howling Commandoes. Childhood friend and colleague of Captain America. Born March tenth, 1917. Died… well, I guess that's corrupt data now."

While she kept busy flapping her mouth, he got close enough that, if she wanted, she could reach out and touch him. Her breathing stuttered, and she nearly choked herself trying to get it under control again. One foot moved back of its own volition, preparing for a race. More than one agent had submitted reports of alleged assassinations by the Winter Soldier. The work was always brutal, but efficient.

How efficiently would he kill her?

She looked up, expecting to find the same frigid mask he'd presented before. But while she'd been looking away, the crack had broken into a flood. He had a face built for emotion, she realized. Everything he felt fluttered across his eyes, pulled around his lips, crept into the miniscule features that made his expression. She'd never seen a man so vulnerable.

And it scared the shit out of her.

"Do you… know me?" Even his voice was different. Curious, almost timid. Nothing like the way he'd spoken before.

Couldn't he tell?

"Not personally," she said. "I just – I know a lot of things."

He closed his eyes, and Hal watched his body language as the Soldier re-emerged. Shoulders back. Chin up. Mouth hard. When he opened his eyes, they still had the lightest touch of emotion, but the man was clearly in control of himself again.

"My mission is to recover the Compendium. I wasn't ordered to kill you; give it to me and I won't have to."

Faintly, hardly aware of what she was doing, she said, "Sorry, I don't think I can do that."

He lowered his chin, took an ominous step forward, and Hal knew he was moving in for the kill.

"Wait! Please!" Before she could really think it through, she tossed her bag at the oncoming soldier. He batted it aside with his metal arm, annoyance scrawled clearly across his face. Hal held up her hands, like she could stop him by pushing the air. "No, really, I don't have anything! Everything is in that bag." The only remotely compromising in there was Fury's list of contacts, and it was nothing more than a list of cell numbers. The names were all well known. She wasn't risking anyone else with this little gamble. "See?" She held out her arms and twirled. In her snug jeans and thin tunic shirt, it would've taken some skills to hide anything. Hopefully, he could tell she had no idea what the crap she was doing. "I'm not carrying anything valuable, I _swear_."

Fortunately, Hal had always been a bad liar. And she was telling the truth. The Winter Soldier would be able to read her if she was lying. Or he could assume she had training. It would take an awful lot of training to fool him, though. He clearly didn't think much of her when she threw her purse at him – hopefully he didn't think too much of her now.

He stopped for a moment and glanced at her pack. Though his face didn't move, his eyes darted across the bag, sweeping it, and Hal could tell he was weighing his options. For some reason, this seemed to be a new experience for him – having options.

When he finally looked up again, she held her breath.

"Go."

"Really?"

His face remained utterly stoic, and when he gave no further response, Hal nodded to herself. She backed up a step. Another. He didn't pursue. Trying not to think about what he could do to her when she had her back turned, she spun on her heel and fled back the way she came. Her bag stayed where it landed, a scant yard from the Winter Soldier's feet.

.O.O.O.

She was fast, he'd give her that. Nearly as fast as he was. Fortunately, a foot race wasn't part of the plan. He gave her a head start, plenty of time to glance over her shoulder a few dozen times, and occupied himself going through her little peace offering, just in case she was trying to be clever.

If she didn't have anything to hide, she'd still be in her apartment, sheltering from the chaos outside, instead of throwing a paltry collection of belongings into a sack and running for it. She hadn't lied when she'd said she carried nothing of value, but she'd been flirting with a half-truth. He could see it in the way her thumb rubbed across the base of her knuckles, her compulsive swallowing. She'd wanted to keep something down, leave out a piece of information. So, she didn't have the Compendium on her person, but she was on her way to retrieve it.

Once she had it, he would take it from her. If she resisted, he'd kill her as quickly as possible, take the Compendium, and consider this damned secondary mission a success.

Peirce had stopped to speak with him, just before he was deployed aboard the hellicarrier, with a photo of a young woman and an exasperated smirk. _"Once you're done here, find this girl. She's carrying something called the Compendium. Get it. It may be important."_ Then his superior had left, shaking his head and muttering about _Fury_ and his _little projects_. The Soldier took the photo, took the order, and continued with his mission.

Then the fight. The man from the bridge. _"I'm with you… to the end of the line."_ The fall. The r_escue_.

Memories. He'd forgotten how to hold them, how to study or dismiss them. They roared through his mind, thundering in his skull until he almost missed the rubber mouth guard between his teeth and the burning crackle of electricity shivering through his sinuses…

He'd needed a distraction. Without a point to focus on, he would lose control completely. And then his secondary mission appeared, bustling along like she knew she was hunted. Alone. Unarmed. In the open. So he obeyed his instincts and pursued. This would be an easy assignment.

And it would've been if she hadn't said that name.

_Bucky Barnes._

Did everyone know that name? Why? Who was Bucky? Who was this girl to know?

He'd been angry.

_You were terrified_, a little voice whispered at the back of his mind. He shook his head, like he could dislodge the murmur of dissent.

He'd been angry.

But she didn't have the Compendium yet. So he would have to wait. In a moment, he would follow.

He found nothing of value in her bag except a list of numbers and names. Emergency contacts, perhaps, in case something went wrong.

Well. Something had certainly gone wrong.

He valued the list, because he recognized the first name: Steve Rodgers. His mission was in contact with the man from the bridge, or she would be soon.

Maybe this mission could serve as more than a distraction after all.

**A/N: Ladies and gentlemen, if you could all please look to the right and shout "Shrubby, this is all your fault" on the count of three, I'd be much obliged. Ready? One. Two. Three.**

_**Shrubby, this is all your**_** fault!**

**Very nice. Thank you.**

**Welcome to the show! **

**I like making new friends, and I always reply to reviews, so please leave your donations in the box below. Thankies much!**


	2. 2

**Disclaimer: For fun, not food.**

.2.

She sprinted to the end of the alley. By the time she reached the street, her lungs fought for each breath, and her body forced her to slow to a determined jog. But she wouldn't go any slower than that for fear of the boogie man in the lane behind her.

The subway was ancient history. No time. And her location had already been compromised. It was time for plan B. She threw herself at the first payphone she passed.

Hal had enough change in her pocket to make one call. She summoned Fury's list of numbers to her mind's eye and immediately chose the first entry. Captain America. If a man with that many muscles hadn't survived the Triskellion's fall, then no one else was likely to. Or they'd be so far underground they wouldn't remember what the sun looked like.

And maybe a man with biceps that large had at least a snowball's chance against the Winter Soldier.

She fished out her meager cash, fed the machine, and plugged in the Captain's number. As she waited for the line to connect, she propped an open palm against the glass, balancing herself as her breaths began to even out. The street around the phone appeared empty, but Hal was through trusting appearances for the day. The assassin could be anywhere. She could be in his crosshairs that very second.

The line rang three times, each buzz sending a nervous trill down her spine, and she dropped her forehead to rest against the back of her hand.

She didn't want to die here.

A click on the line. Hal didn't wait for an acknowledgement.

"Captain Rodgers?" She hated how her voice trembled.

"_Agent Romanoff, actually,"_ a woman said. _"How did you get this number?"_

Hal closed her eyes. She was already screwed. Quietly, she said, "Fury gave it to me."

A bit more patiently, and with a strong tinge of curiosity, Romanoff asked, _"Who is this?"_

"Haley Renold." Blinking away tears, she opened her eyes to check the street again. It was like a waking nightmare, that awful moment of consciousness after starting from a bad dream, still sleep-baffled enough to see monsters in the window. Nothing was there, but she _felt_ there was.

The agent must've heard more in her voice than Hal meant to say, because her next words were careful, almost gentle. _"Are you in trouble? Is that why Fury gave you Rodger's number?"_

"Please." She looked up at the nearest street sign. "I'm on Thirteenth and West. I don't have money for another call. I can't make my rendezvous. The Soldier has my go bag…"

"_The Soldier? Miss Renold… hold on a sec. Cap? Phone's for you."_

Hal held her breath, agonizing over the precious seconds lost as Agent Romanoff surrendered the phone to Captain Rodgers. And then…

"_Hello? This is Captain Rodgers speaking."_

All that pent up air rushed out at once, transforming halfway into a relieved sob.

At the other end of the line, she could make out murmurs as the Captain covered the phone's mouthpiece to ask Romanoff a question. In a moment, he was back. _"Miss Renold? Are you alright?"_

He spoke with such authority, and Hal wanted to answer, to give him all the information he needed, but fear had hold of her tongue, and the payphone gave a chirp to warn her that her time was almost up.

"Captain Rodgers… Please…"

The line went dead, and a pleasant voice asked for more change in return for more minutes.

But Hal was all out.

She met her reflection's eyes in the glass, and caught the glitter of tears sliding down her face. Dozens of mission reports flashed through her mind, casualties highlighted in red, collateral damage listed in a priority footnote. Fury had cast her in the role of an agent, but she had all the skills of a civilian. She'd read enough reports to know what happened when civilians found themselves in the line of fire.

She was so, so scared.

But she didn't have time for tears and feels if she wanted to live. So, trembling, she rubbed her face dry with her palms, trying to erase the evidence of her weakness and restore some of her flagging adrenaline. Blink. A deep breath through the nose.

What now, then?

She could still take the metro, but Hal didn't want to put so many people in jeopardy unless she absolutely had to. Agent Romanoff had her location now. It might be best to stay put. But she was forgetting the Soldier. Had he forgotten her? Really, if he wanted her dead, it wouldn't matter where she tried to run.

Alright. Staying put.

Decided, she dropped to the sidewalk in a sprawled kind of pretzel, propping herself up against the wall beside the phone. Anyone walking by would assume she was waiting for a call. That she was perfectly normal. What self-respecting secret agent wore chucks, anyway?

Just as she got comfortable, wriggling around until she found the ideal position – or at least the one that did the least damage to her tailbone – a van swung around the corner. She tensed and pulled her feet under herself, ready to pop up and run as the vehicle decelerated. However, as it approached, the passenger-side window rolled down, and a familiar man poked his head out the window. He was S.H.I.E.L.D. His file leapt to mind. Greg Johnson. Not the brightest or the best, but he was part of security, and Hal felt hope tickling inside her ribcage.

"Hey!" he shouted. "Renolds, right?"

Close enough. "Yeah." She pushed herself up and headed toward the car. Halfway across the sidewalk, she realized the back was teaming with man-shaped shadows, and instinct killed the happy bubbles inside.

"Who's with you?"

Johnson glanced over his shoulder, and the driver shrugged. He looked back at her. His eyes were darker. "What's left of my team. Lost a few when the Triskellion fell." He paused, and Hal couldn't help feeling that he was staging his delivery very carefully. "We're headed to meet up with the rest of the security forces, and anyone they've wrangled up, so we can launch a proper rescue and recovery. It's gonna take a lot of manpower to comb through that wreck."

"Oh yeah," Hal said, glancing again at the van's tinted rear windows, trying to make out faces, "Lots and lots."

Johnson nodded towards the rear door. "Hop in. We can give you a lift to command."

Something was very not right. A group of armed (_trained_ – sweet bean paste, these guys actually knew what they were doing) S.H.I.E.L.D. agents just happened to appear out of the blue minutes after a super soldier with a cybernetic arm attacked her? And if Romanoff or Captain America had sent them, these guys would've mentioned it. Quite a coincidence, and coincidences made Hal edgy. They were never as accidental as they seemed.

"I took the day off."

"Consider yourself recalled." His hand clenched impulsively over the window rim, and the tiniest of corners turned down the edges of his mouth. "Get in."

"My mommy always told me not to get in strange cars with boys," Hal quipped, "and you're driving the mother of all pedo vans. You just need a lollipop and a lost dog poster."

And with that, the final drags of civility vanished from Johnson's face. "Fine."

The rear door burst open, and three men leapt out. Hal made it about three feet before one grabbed her hair. She opened her mouth to scream, but as she pulled in air, the man yanked her off balance and sent her back slamming into the pavement. The air left her lungs on impact, and she couldn't so much as gasp. Before she could catch her breath, the men heaved her up, pinioning her arms, clapping a gloved hand over her mouth, and swept her into the back of the van. The tires squealed as the last man's feet left the pavement. By the time they got the door closed, the driver had them well over the speed limit.

Hal thrashed in her captors' grasp, trying to scream, land a punch, deliver a kick – _anything_. Something jabbed her in the side, and her world lit up with pain. This time, her scream made it past the hand over her mouth, but the electric shock left her well and truly tazed, so she was helpless to do anything else. Even when the device left her side, the pain echoed in violent spasms. But she'd lost all powers of voluntary motion.

Up front, the men were talking.

"We're lucky he's broken. If he wasn't, we'd've lost the Compendium," Johnson was saying.

No, no, that wasn't right. He couldn't possibly… well, he must.

Sensing her eyes on him, Johnson turned around and offered a toothy smile. "Yeah, sweetheart. We know. Peirce figured it out. After he'd given the Winter Soldier his orders, unfortunately. Took us a little while to realize you weren't carrying the Compendium." He clucked. "You _are_ the Compendium. All of Fury's dirty little secrets, locked up tight in that pretty little head of yours."

The worst possible scenario. She'd thought it had been meeting the Winter Soldier in a dark alley. She'd been wrong. Apparently, Peirce had been part of the… undesirable elements that took out so many of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s resources. So were these men. Had any loyal agents survived? Apart from the two Avengers she'd spoken with on the phone? She moaned into the glove still clamped over her mouth, half suffocating her.

Johnson shook his head. "You'll have plenty of time to talk later. Save your breath." He glanced at the man still holding her. "Drop her. She's not going anywhere."

Apparently, Johnson's troop were a literal bunch, because instead of just relaxing his grip and allowing Hal to settle on the end of the bench, her muffler tossed her on the floor. He didn't seem as confident in her passivity, though, and settled a boot in the middle of her spine. Not enough to hurt, per say, but enough to let her know she'd be sniffing the carpet for a while.

"Why?"

Not the most articulate expression of her distress, but, hey, the carpet smelled rank, and she was getting scrambled. Too many death threats in one day, she supposed.

Turned out, Johnson didn't need any clarification. He leaned down until his chin hovered just over the arm rest, and stage whispered, gleefully: "Hail Hydra."

Hal felt her eyes bug out and the blood drain from her face. Johnson laughed, and the others shared in his humor, humming and chuckling.

He looked back out the windshield a split second before another car struck them broadside.

Hal slid head-first into the opposite side, cracking her head against steel, though her momentum was broken by knees and boots. It could've been worse. Dazed, she watched as the men around her flew into action. Safeties clicked off in a raucous symphony between shouts, commands, a few pained yelps. From her position, Hal could just see a spray of blood across the roof. Someone in the back had been hit by flying glass. Judging by his comrades' panic, he must be bleeding out. But they had more pressing concerns.

Several left the van, shattering windows to escape the wreck, and gunfire rattled around the stranded vehicle. A number of others sat, wilted, in their seats, knocked out on impact, including the man whose feet Hal found herself thrown over. Or, at least, she hoped he was unconscious. A spider web crack in the glass fractured the light stabbing her eyes, and Hal tried to blink away the rainbows.

More men fled their seats, and, for a moment, Hal thought they might've forgotten her.

Something cold pressed against her forehead, and she blearily recognized a gun. Johnson had crawled over the seats to straddle her, and now he had his weapon in her face.

"Sorry, kid," he panted. "Looks like you won't get to have that talk after all."

The window above exploded, and just before she closed her eyes to protect them from the glass, she saw a gloved hand break through to seize Johnson by the neck. A gurgled scream. _Snap_. Johnson's dead weight fell on her. She opened her eyes to find his lifeless face propped on the seat above, his neck broken and stretched at a freakishly unnatural angle.

She screamed. Suddenly all that mattered was getting the body off of her, but she was still disoriented from the blow to her head, and no matter how she shoved, kicked, or flailed, all she managed to do was give the dead traitor a strange reanimation, gravity moving his body in response to her struggle, so it seemed like he twitched, clung, reached for her. Her panic escalated to tears, and she howled as she tried to buck him off and escape the gap between rows.

The door tore away with a terrible screech, and full light poured in. Blinding. Johnson rose, propelled by an unseen force, and flew haphazardly out of the van. For a second, she breathed a little easier.

Then a hand came down on her ankle and began dragging her out of the car. Blood and broken pieces of machinery slid past her, and she tried to grab onto one of the seats she passed, but her grip was far too weak, and the hand on her foot shook her loose with one jolt. Her legs fell out the open door, and the hand released her only to seize her again by the arm. The assailant hauled her up on legs shaky as a fawn's, and Hal found herself face to face with a familiar glare.

The Winter Soldier had kept her in his crosshairs after all.

**A/N: Thanks to my first responders! You are all so encouraging!**

**I have a question for you: would you prefer chapters like the last two (2,000 - 3,000 words) a couple times a week, or a larger chapter (approx. 5,000 words) once a week? **

**As I move into crunch-time for the Big Move, I will have less free time, and, honestly, reviews help remind me that I'm responsible for this story, so any help you could lend would be awesome for my motivation. Thanks again!**

**Replies to Anons:**

**Shrubby: Thank ya, darlin'! You will always be my first fan girl. ;P **

**Inkwriter: Thank you so much for the review! Glad you found my new project. Hal's character is much more... discreet than Tyrrin's, so she'll take a little while to bloom, I think, but she will. Thank you, thank you, and thank you again!**

**Guest: Well, thank you very much! I am actually planning a sequel for _Circuit Ghost_, but Shrubby really wanted me to write this first, and a plot bunny or two sank their teeth into my butt, so... yeah. But, yes, there is a sequel in the works. I hope you enjoy your fix! I'm so very flattered!**


	3. 3

**Disclaimer: For kicks and giggles, I swear.**

.3.

The Winter Soldier marched her off the street and into an adjoining maze of alleys and back lanes. He never slowed or paused, not even when Hal tripped, and he wound up dragging her for half a block. Behind them, the wreck drew an increasing crowd of gawpers, young people with camera phones held high and business folk murmuring fervently to 911 operators. It wouldn't be long before a different sort of crew turned up. Possibly Hydra. Maybe SHIELD. But no one was looking the right way to see Hal dragged into the alley, or the metal-armed assassin leading her. She was still on her own, and she couldn't tell if she'd jumped from frying pan to fire and back to the pan, or from fire to pan to fire. To be fair, she hadn't enjoyed a lot of choice in her leaping of late.

Really, though, it was just a shitty day all 'round.

And now they found themselves at the edge of one of the worst parts of one of the worst cities in America. New York Avenue, where more buildings stood empty than inhabited. Or at least _legally_ inhabited.

The Soldier kicked open a door to an old factory, hauled her inside, and then jerked her to a stop as he surveyed their surroundings.

Far as Hal could see, it was an old dump like any other. Broken black and white tile, broken windows, broken stairs leading to a second level with more broken things. She was much more concerned with herself. Her head _hurt_. A _lot_. Enough to making thinking difficult. And while she hadn't gashed herself on anything too badly, her forearms sported a fine array of little nicks and scratches just begging for infection. Not to mention her left knee – banged against the driver's seat in the crash – would probably never forgive her.

Satisfied with what he saw, the Soldier moved on to what used to be the business's office block. His literal iron grip on Hal never eased, even when the doorways they passed proved too narrow for them both to pass at once. Maybe that was a good thing. She felt awfully dizzy, and without the Soldier's unyielding support, she might not be able to keep upright. But would that be a bad thing? She couldn't keep her thoughts straight. Not an entirely new sensation, but she hadn't suffered the terrible vertigo of freefalling into her own mind for quite some time, and she hadn't missed it.

She needed her exercises.

The Soldier found a room he seemed to like – dark, no windows, relatively little clutter – and threw her into the wall opposite the door. She hit it hard enough to bounce back off and hit the floor, but Hal used the automatic urge to consciously shy away from the pain in order to withdraw from herself. Releasing her awareness of the physical world, she sank into her thoughts and pulled together her library.

Her library was enormous, and ever growing. Dozens of floors, sharing a central atrium with a staircase that wound up through them all – a tower of knowledge with a single skylight to illuminate it all. Locked in vaults below and quiet rooms along the walls rested all the information too dangerous for public knowledge. The very lowest room had born SHIELD's insignia for several years now.

Her grand library.

The place was a mess. Piles of books scattered everywhere. Doors left open to the archives. Fear clouding the air like fog. It would never do.

_Count to three_. She picked three tomes from the nearest jumble and returned them, ceremoniously, to their proper places. Her goldfish, Primus. _One._ Lunch in the cafeteria on the third Monday of her second semester of college. _Two_. "A Country Doctor" by Franz Kafka. _Three._

With those three put away, all the others rose and returned to their places, and the haze of fear faded as Hal watched her library return to order. Rustling paper. Creaking shelves. Squeaking doors and clicking locks. Everything as it should be. Once again, Hal had control. Satisfied, she turned to the door and stepped back to her current predicament.

The information poured in. Her shoulder burned where she'd struck it against the wall, and her right sleeve hung in tatters to reveal where the old brick had skinned her. Black mold crept along the walls, and a collection of feathers and white bird droppings in the corner, near a hole in the ceiling, revealed where pigeons had nested last spring. Despite the changing seasons, the dim room remained cool, and Hal shuddered, pulling her uninjured arm around herself for heat. She wished she hadn't left her jacket in her bag. Both gone now.

She felt his eyes on her before she saw him, and when she finally dared to look toward the door, she found the Winter Soldier sitting there, just inside the frame. He had his knees drawn up and his metal arm draped across them. A knife rested in his right hand, gleaming in the faint glow of the accidental skylight in the ceiling. His gaze bored into her, unblinking, and Hal could only hold it for an instant before she had to look away again.

They sat like that for a good fifteen minutes before he said anything. She certainly wasn't gonna go first.

And then… "What did I miss?"

From her place across the room, Hal jumped. "What?"

"Hydra took you," he said. Calm, intent, threatening. He didn't really care about this, but it bothered him to have 'missed' something. And he'd get whatever he wanted, one way or another. Hal had no doubt. He angled his head down just a fraction of an inch, shadowing his eyes even more in the half-light, shifting the darkness shrouding half his face. "You didn't retrieve the Compendium. All you did was call for extraction. But they took you. What. Did. I. Miss?"

"W-well…" Hal licked her lips and shoved her hair out of her face with one trembling hand. He didn't know. He didn't _know_. What would he do once he found out what she was? Could she lie?

He cocked his head, and Hal wondered if he could sense the _intention_ to lie. She knew she was an easy read, but surely she wasn't that obvious. Setting his mouth in a hard line, the Soldier rose. And twirled his knife.

Hal's pulse boomed in her ears.

"I think you're confused," she said, scrambling backwards, eyes on the knife. There wasn't a lot of room to maneuver, and she found herself trapped in the corner almost as soon as she moved. The Soldier advanced until he stood well inside her personal space, and he held up the knife for her to examine. For her to fantasize about what he would do with it. Hal got the idea he was more imaginative than she was. Her voice came out as a hoarse whisper. "I wasn't sent to collect anything."

"Maybe." The Soldier slipped the knife up behind her ear, and Hal stopped breathing. Her heart felt like it would explode out of her chest, it beat so fast. Slowly, like he'd hypnotized himself with the glitter of the blade, the Soldier drew the point along her throat, just under the jaw, pantomiming a kill stroke.

Hal bit her lip and closed her eyes. She didn't want to see this. She didn't want to watch as he opened her up and took her apart. Feeling would be bad enough.

_She was going to die._

His breath hit her ear, and she shuddered.

"Why are you important?"

She tried to answer, but the knife still pressed against her throat, and her breath stuttered. Taking a deep breath, she opened her eyes and stared straight up at the ceiling, at the patch of blue sky directly above her. Purple clouds scudded by in an orange sky, stained by sunset. The light looked warm. A perfect day's end.

Nowhere left to run.

_I'm sorry, Director Fury._

"I _am_ the Compendium."

.O.O.O.

Nick Fury watched a family – mother and father, two little boys – leave the Old Stone House. The boys chattered about _cool_ little details they'd discovered. About the war that sparked a new nation. Fury wondered what, three hundred years in the future, people would say about the battle over the Potomac, or the alien invasion of New York. Of the super heroes and the not-so-super heroes who put everything they had on the line in the name of freedom.

He snorted.

He must be getting old. Didn't matter what they thought three hundred years from now. They'd have their own disasters to deal with. And he'd be far too dead to know or care. The planet's defense would be someone else's problem. Anyway, he had enough immediate concerns to worry over something so inconsequential as a legacy.

Where the hell was Renold?

He'd just love to give her a call and find out, but there were two little problems with that idea. For one thing, if she got his message and got out when she was supposed to, she'd have followed protocol and ditched her cell. Secondly, he was supposed to be dead, and if she'd been compromised, anyone could answer that phone.

Something had happened. While he waited, he'd run the math. Even with the worst traffic D.C. could throw at her, she should've arrived at least an hour ago. Maybe Hydra got to her. Maybe an idiot cabby got in a wreck. So long as he stood in the park waiting for her, he had no way of knowing.

He'd been afraid this might happen. From the day he arranged for her to serve as the Compendium, he'd second guessed his plan to use her anonymity as a defense. But she'd gone through with it, and he told himself that changing the plan after she'd taken on his secrets would be a greater risk than continuing. It had worked. She came to clean his level every day, keeping her head down, becoming part of the routine. After the usual curiosity over the new janitor – always short lived – she blended into the background, only surfacing when he instructed her to, only drawing attention in ways that would lower her perceived threat level. Everyone assumed he hired her because she was quiet, because she kept her nose out of other people's business. Both invaluable traits in SHIELD's janitorial staff, and he made sure to never give anyone reason to think otherwise.

All the while, he fed her files, photographs, rumors, and reports he didn't trust in SHIELD's computers. She kept the big secrets, the things he was afraid to put in writing. His fears about their planet's future. Threats still gathering force in places he couldn't reach. Possible moles. All the juicy stuff.

And now she'd disappeared.

He looked at the bloody smear the sun had left on the horizon and shook his head. They'd failed. No. He'd failed. She'd done her part flawlessly. It wasn't her fault he'd refused to allow her so much as a basic self defense class. Invisible. Harmless. _Jeopardized._

A shadow came to stand beside him, a shadow with violently red hair.

"Report."

"We've recovered Rodgers, sir," she said, voice made huskier by exhaustion. "Teams are already working to recover survivors from the Triskelion and the hellicarriers. No sign of the Winter Soldier."

"We have another problem." The red faded to purple, and night crept over the sky.

He lowered his sunglasses so he could look his most trusted agent in the eye. "I lost a good book this afternoon. I want it back."

**A/N: So, it looks like the "shorts" have it. I will aim to update twice a week with these shortish chapters from here on out, though I must warn you that next week is moving week, so I might not be regular. Patience, I pray thee. **

**_HOWEVER: I would like to issue a (roughly) twelve hour CHALLENGE! If five of you can review by the time I get up tomorrow, I'll crank out a second chapter before I go to bed on Sunday._ Otherwise, I'll update Tuesday (lord willin' and the creek don't rise...). **

**Thank you all for your enthusiasm! It's contagious. **

**Replies to anons:**

**Shrubby: Thanks for the review, hon! Yes, he's back, and there will be LOTS of him in the upcoming chapter. Hope this update made your day a little better!**

**Inkwriter: Thanks for the review! Wow, you really know how to flatter me, don't you? It looks like you've been out voted on the length issue, but I promise to keep up with the quality. Thanks again! Hope you enjoyed this chapter. **


	4. 4

**Disclaimer: For fun, because procrastination is for winners.**

.4.

The girl talked.

The Soldier listened.

So much he didn't know, and so much she could provide. History, social structure. Wars he may have fought in, people he might have killed. Endless reams of knowledge. A world in which he might build context. His hollow thoughts so desperately needed a framework to expand in, information to make themselves more than ghosts, and here it was. She offered an escape from his own mind by bridging the gap between his empty head and the world of sound and light around him.

She recited newspaper articles, complete with dates.

She quoted new laws and revisions. Supreme Court rulings. Offered a review of politics over the last several decades.

She gave him the bus and train schedules, stop by stop, from memory.

It took him hours, when her voice rasped and her knees shook with the exertion of standing against the wall, for him to realize he still held his knife to her throat. And he realized he'd never asked a question to prompt these answers. The Compendium sought to justify her existence. She wanted to prove her value.

Tears marked her face in long streaks, even though her face hadn't twisted itself into the usual grimace of a weeping woman. The tears, he thought, must be from shock. Or from fear she felt too keenly to show any other way. The Compendium was fighting for her life.

She had succeeded.

She was _important_.

Beneath the layers of endless trivia, she must hold real answers. She knew solutions to problems he hadn't confronted. She knew SHIELD. She knew "Steve." And she had no training. He took the knife away from her neck, ignoring the red drop running down her neck, and used the flat of the blade to lift away the dirty blond hair from her eyes. She stopped speaking – stopped _breathing_ – and the Soldier could read her panic, clear as day. Of course, she would try to protect those secrets locked up in her mind, but he knew how to get passwords, names, and confessions from his missions. This would be far easier. The Compendium was an unlocked library.

"Tell me about SHIELD."

"I… I'm sorry." Eyes so full of fear, and her refusal sounded like an apology. "I can't."

The blade left her hair, and he tip came to rest by the corner of her left eye. Words were for commands and queries. The Soldier didn't need words for threats.

"I can't." She closed her eyes, as if that could stop his blade, and her denial became a litany. "Ican'tIcan'tIcan'tIcan'tI…"

He pressed the very tip into the fold where her upper lid stretched into the rest of her face, increasing pressure until blood leaked like tears. Real tears mixed with the scarlet trail, streaking her face even further. She made half-coherent pleas, but kept her fists at her side, clearly aware of what he could do to her, and the risks of annoying him. Not long now, and she would break. A good thing. He didn't know how long he would need her, and if he damaged her, she would become a liability when they moved.

His free hand, the stronger one, held her by the jaw, ensuring she wouldn't try to jerk away and lose an eye before he was ready to take it.

"PLEASE!"

Even closer. Nearing the edge, and beyond that she would betray herself, betray her masters, and give him what he needed. For… Hydra? No. This stopped being about Hydra the minute she called the Captain. Before that. The helicarrier. The bridge. The Soldier had continued to fight as his priorities shifted from orders and targets to fear and self preservation. And looking back, he couldn't tell where he could draw the line, when he began fighting for fear of the consciousness blooming within rather than the command of his superiors. Now, though, now he knew. He remembered that he _didn't_. Something was wrong, and it had been that way for a long time. Hydra's hold snapped entirely when he pulled the Captain out of the river, and his confusion wore it thin before he ever stepped aboard the massive air ship.

His mission was his own. His mission was under his knife, trying not to sob so her face wouldn't move against his knife and widen the wound. His mission had no right to cry. She had the answers he needed, and he would get them from her even if he had to carve them out.

"Tell me about Captain Rodgers."

"Please…"

"Tell me about Hydra."

"P-please…"

He lowered the knife, but only so he could slam her back into the brick by her jaw.

"Tell me who I am!"

Shattering glass broke him from his mission, and he turned to listen as several voices yelled over the echoes of tinkling glass. Another smash. More yells. Young. Male. No agents – of either SHIELD or Hydra – would make such noise. His mission opened her mouth, another plea on her lips, but he clapped a hand over her mouth before she could speak. The voices were approaching, and he counted half a dozen footsteps in the hall. He eyed the mission trembling under his hand.

This would have to wait.

.O.O.O.

Hal didn't know what held her together. Everything inside felt liquefied. Nothing solid. Nothing to hold onto. Tears and blood and bile creeping up her throat. And words.

"Please…"

When he clapped a hand over her mouth, she felt too confused to enjoy any relief. Didn't he want her to talk? He'd asked questions. Didn't he want the answers anymore? What did that mean for her?

Death, probably.

But then she heard the voices, the footsteps, and she realized what was happening. Some idiot punks just interrupted the Winter Soldier.

The Soldier lifted his knife-wielding hand, pressing one finger to his lips in the universal command for silence. This was an order Hal could obey. When he released her, she kept her peace. He watched her a moment to be sure she'd comply, and then he turned, knife at the ready, and crept toward the door. He and the boys in the hall made a strange juxtaposition. Hal knew the more dangerous man was in the room, but he moved like a ghost, utterly silent. On the other hand, the boys made enough noise to wake the dead and start a small avalanche in the Rockies. A wolf stalking some noisy sheep. He pressed himself to the side of the door just before the young men came into view, laughing and bouncing baseball bats on their shoulders. Somehow Hal doubted they planned on a clean game in a local diamond.

One stopped and nudged his friend, nodding through the door toward Hal.

It took her a second to realize the Soldier left her there on purpose. She was the bait. The boys would file through the door, and he'd drop them all before they realized they were dead men walking.

Why not let them pass by? Did he think they might compromise his newfound 'base?' It wasn't much to write home about, but maybe he had a thing for skylights and roaches.

"Hey, babe, you lost?" one called, taking the first step into the room.

The rest followed, smiling, glaring, leering. Hal knew how she must look. Battered. Recently homeless or someone else's conquest left at the scene of the crime. And she didn't like the way the little gang was looking at her.

A few murmured cat calls, but they didn't have the opportunity to build up any steam, because as soon as they all stood in the room, the first two dropped dead. The first fell silently, but the second gurgled through the blood rushing from his slit throat, and his buddies all turned to see what was going on. If it hadn't been for that, they might not have realized they had a problem until the first body thudded to earth. The catcalls turned to battle cries, but Hal could hear the fearful screams they masked. So could the Soldier.

Face blank, eyes dark, he spun with his knife to take down a third gang member with a stab up and under the rib cage, simultaneously grabbing another boy's bat with his cybernetic hand. He crushed the wood in his fist, and the attacker sprang back with a yelp, clutching the splintered remains. A third boy rushed the Soldier, and a kick to the gut sent him crashing across the room, coughing blood.

Hal moved to cover her face. She tried to turn away, but a screamed "Bitch!" forced her attention back to the melee. The only boy not interested in trying to jump the Soldier bore down on her, face twisted in rage, spittle flying with his curse. Maybe he didn't realize his friends needed his help. Maybe he knew they were dead already and wanted a bit of payback. He hefted his bat, and Hal scrambled for a weapon. Nothing at hand. A few feathers. Rotten files. Nothing that could make a dent. Her body wasn't exactly a registered weapon, but she was running low on options. So she waited for the swing, ducked under, and barreled into her assailant. She caught him off guard and forced him back a few steps, but her momentum carried her farther into the attack than she'd planned, and she couldn't bounce away before the bat came back for a crack at her head. Luckily, the angle was poor, and the strike was more reaction than blow. He pulled back to hit her again, and she grabbed onto the weapon, clinging for dear life. Flustered, he tried to shake her off, but Hal made like a Jack Russell Terrier and refused to let go.

Too bad she forgot he had feet. His heel cracked against her knee, and she fell back, gathering more scratches and bruises from her landing as her hands automatically released the bat.

"Crazy bitch."

Panting, she glared up at him, tasting dirt and blood. What she wouldn't give to be stronger. For training like the Black Widow, or weapons like Iron Man. Self defense was a pipe dream, and she hated the frailty she wore so well.

She remembered this feeling. She'd suffered a milder version when Fury subjected her to the agents' training course. Technically, it was regulation. Really, it was revenge. Or so she'd always believed. While it was true all SHIELD employees had to pass a thorough physical, those were nearly always conducted by doctors behind the scenes, and janitors weren't expected to be anywhere near an agent's level. Only those expected to fight had to run the course. But Hal came back from her first (and last) vacation to find Fury ready with a raise and a direct threat to never take another vacation _ever_ again. Hal never knew if something happened while she was gone, or if Fury just liked his office a certain way. Or maybe he just needed to vent, and goodness knew she made a convenient punching bag. So for her bi-annual evaluation, he made her run the course. Disaster – pure and simple. She could run as fast as most agents, but she had nothing like their muscle mass, and the truth was, she was _tiny_. Vaulting anything was out of the question. Climbing took herculean effort. Mounting a chest high balance beam – laughable. She wound up with a record for the longest run. Humiliated and exhausted, she'd accused her boss of petulance to his face.

But, of course, Fury always had his reasons.

"_They need to know you're weak. When shit hits the fan and the bad guys are prioritizing targets, you need to be at the bottom of their list. You know enough to get out, and that's all you need. No one should remember you longer than it takes to dismiss you."_

But they hadn't dismissed her, and now she was screwed. If she won this fight, the Winter Soldier would still torture, interrogate, and kill her. To be fair, the Winter Soldier hadn't been part of Fury's plan, but things like the Hydra punks in the van were, and if it weren't for the Soldier, she'd still be with them. It looked like she'd landed where she always did – on her own. Fury wasn't coming. Captain America wasn't coming. No help. No hope. Just her carefully un-cultivated skills between her and an extremely violent end.

She got to her feet and raised her fists.

Her opponent raised his eyebrows and laughed.

She stood ducked low like a boxer, feet spread, hovering on the balls of her feet as she waited for him to make the first move. Of course, she had no idea what she was doing, but it was something, and that seemed better than nothing.

Then the Soldier stepped up behind her opponent and grabbed him by the neck. Next thing Hal knew, the boy was staring at the skylight with empty eyes.

She spared him a passing wish for peace. She didn't know what to do when someone died. So much information in her head, but no way to use it. Wasn't like she could build him a Viking funeral barge. No time to honor the fallen enemy.

The Soldier was before her.

He stood straight as, well, a soldier, and his face had never seemed so dangerously blank. His head was full of a different kind of knowledge, and he knew how to use it. Didn't know much else, apparently, but he could snuff her as easily as breathe.

She didn't lower her fists.

This could be her last stand. Pretty freaking sad. But she couldn't just _let_ him shove her against that wall again and press that knife to her face. No training, no skills, no muscle. Just a lot of adrenaline and too many near-death experiences for one day.

This must be the most ridiculous thing he'd ever seen.

.O.O.O.

The Soldier dispatched the intruders. It wasn't difficult, though the interruption was frustrating. He'd been so close to an answer, and now he would have to start again.

He saw the mission raise her fists as he came up to the final target, but he didn't get a good look at her until he'd replaced the intruder, standing before her, facing her fists. Watching resolve harden her face. Determination burn in her eyes.

And it reminded him of…

_Steve._

_Sandy blond hair in his eyes, blood on his face, trying to take on the neighborhood bullies in a fair fight. Kid couldn't win even if he fought dirty, and there he was, ready to trade punches like he was in the ring. _

_He shook his head. _

_Kid would get him killed one of these days or, worse, himself…_

The Soldier grabbed his head, letting the knife clattered to the ground beside him as he fell to his knees. Past and present swam in and out of focus, layering over the other with thoughts and scents and sandy blond hair. He pulled at his hair, trying to drag out the memories by the roots.

"I _knew_ him."

The mission still stood there, fists up, but eyes wary. The blood on her face. He put it there. Did that make him…?

His head was killing him.

With a wild scream, he drove his forehead against the ground. Over and over and over until he beat the thoughts to death.

**A/N: Still with me, lovelies? So, the deadline wasn't met, but you all made a valiant effort, and I planned on updating yesterday. But I have several metric *beep* tons of issues, and last night my insecurity forced me to sit in a chair, drink some Strongbow, and think about everything I should be doing (better) in life. So that was a fun night. **

**Oh, and it's over ninety and our AC died. *Weeping and gnashing of teeth.* **

**Didn't edit this chapter as much as I would've liked, but hopefully it passes muster. **

**Next update shall be THURSDAY! Because tomorrow is my last day at work. Which means I'll spend most of the day crying and hugging my residents. **

**On the bright side, I did manage to stuff a coworker's locker full of Easter grass. Hey, they've gotta remember me somehow, right?**

**Replies to Anons:**

**Shrubby: Thank you for BOTH reviews, m'dear! I'm happy you think Bucky is in character, because I've been having issues pinning his character down. So much is left to interpretation and there's a lot of room left for development at the end of the film. Gyaaaaa... Thanks again!**

**Guest: Well, thank you very much! I'm blushing now and it's making me hot. My desk fan can't keep up. Stop it, you. I'm sweating enough already. Thanks again!**


	5. 5

**Disclaimer: For fun, not food.**

.5.

Clueless.

Absolutely clueless.

What did one do when a kidnapper beat himself unconscious? Run, probably. Running would be brilliant.

But Hal's mind choked on all the data, and the best she could do was sit. Straight down, in the same spot she'd been standing. A moment ago, she'd been prepared to have the living daylights beaten out of her and suffer the removal of bits and pieces she would definitely miss. And now…

His eyes had glazed over, just before the Soldier dropped to his knees. And then his face just _broke_. He'd looked like an entirely different person. His eyes widened, his mouth softened, and his whole body just drooped. Tired. Sad. Frightened. Hal could almost take offense. If anyone in that room had license to be afraid, it was definitely her.

And now he rested in a crumpled heap, just as he'd sagged after the final crack against the tile.

She didn't know what to do. She didn't have training for this shit. She scrolled through endless articles on PTSD, trauma, kidnapping, and Stockholm Syndrome. Nothing quite fit. Maybe there was no training for this. Maybe this was something new. She'd never find relevant information, because no one had it yet.

But she did know he'd been upset when he looked at her. After he zoned out, he'd _seen_ her, and he'd gotten… angry? Distressed. She didn't know. But he'd been something. And now he was unconscious.

What to do? He'd dropped the knife. She could stab him. But she couldn't. Killing took practice, otherwise Fury wouldn't hold his agents to such high standards. Hal knew in a vague way where to cut, but she couldn't trust she'd hit the right spot the first try, and pain like that would wake the Soldier. So she could try, but if she failed, he'd probably crush her face with his metal fist. As she'd thought earlier, running made sense. If he stayed out long enough, she could put enough distance between them to allow a rescue. Only, no one knew where the Soldier took her, and she had no money to make another call. And, as she'd just witnessed, this wasn't a safe neighborhood. Besides, if he woke up before she'd escaped, he'd get her back, and she doubted he'd be happy about the extra work. She didn't want to get anyone else killed, and she didn't want anyone else to kill her, either. Strange as it seemed, when the Soldier wasn't trying to peel the skin from her bones, he was good protection. And Fury made her to be someone who needed protection.

If she lived through this, she was gonna become a freakin' black belt. Forget Fury. Forget SHIELD. Forget cultivating helplessness. She'd get so good her hands would have to be registered with the state as lethal weapons.

But until then, she was pretty well stuck.

So her concern would be fending off the Soldier. Her best bet was the man who'd been Captain America's best friend in a past life. Of course, she couldn't tell how much of him was left in the Soldier, or how the Soldier came to replace Bucky Barnes, but she knew pain and fear when she saw it.

What was it he'd said? He'd asked if she knew him. And then, when he'd been playing with her face, he'd asked who he was. Hal didn't know, and at the same time she did. Maybe, though, she knew more than _he_ did. The Winter Soldier hadn't behaved as a mentally competent assassin was expected to, and his confusion stirred her interest. How could he _not_ know?

Amnesia. Stress. Brainwashing. Reanimation. Zombification.

Something traumatic.

Maybe she should take one of the dead boys' jackets and drape it over the Soldier. They always gave trauma victims blankets, after all. But she didn't want to touch the bodies, and she didn't want to get any closer to the Soldier. He could kill her with a flick of the wrist if he woke up angry, and even though a few yards of space wouldn't make much of a difference, that precious space might buy her time to win his attention. The Soldier could reason, even at his coldest, if it aided his mission. He couldn't have done all he had without some kind of thought process. She just needed to appeal to his sense of urgency and efficiency.

She could – _would_ – help. And she'd survive.

.O.O.O.

The mission.

His first thought on waking.

He'd lost the mission.

He'd have to begin again. Go on the hunt.

Tedious. Aggravating. Wasting time he couldn't afford. The man from the bridge – _Steve_ – would be looking for him, looking for the mission, and the Soldier didn't know enough to confront the man yet. He wouldn't face that potential foe again until he was better armed with both weapons and intel.

He needed the mission.

Head pounding, he assessed his surroundings.

Someone waited nearby. He could hear them breathing.

_Danger_. In one smooth motion, he sprang back in a crouch, ready to defend or attack.

He found the mission crouched before him, just out of reach, leaning in with a pinched expression. Afraid to run. Afraid to approach. But she flinched back as soon as her inferior reflexes kicked in, and then she was simply afraid of _him_. He remembered her standing with her fists raised, like she had the slightest chance of fighting him off. Pain scratched behind his eyes, and he grit his teeth, refusing to examine the memory. He'd have time for reminiscing when he'd finished with the mission.

And then a gleam of metal near his right hand caught his eye, and he remembered the knife.

"You didn't try to stab me."

The mission smiled ruefully. "I'd be lying if I said the thought didn't cross my mind, but it got mowed down in the middle of a lane by the semi I like to call Common Sense. I couldn't hurt you if my life depended on it – which it does, actually."

He heard new elements in her speech. Confidence, for one. She hadn't stabbed him, but she had a plan now. And her humor was meant to establish a basic emotional connection. Hydra had trained him to ignore such attempts. She was simply employing a different sort of survival tactic, now that subservient begging had failed her. On the other hand, she _appeared_ more cooperative.

He would have to wait and see how she chose to proceed. Only then could he be certain which methods of interrogation would produce the answers he sought.

After several minutes of silence, the mission cleared her throat.

"Clearly you're not with Hydra, so what do you want?"

Such games would not fool him. He'd already given her his demands. "I need information. Everything you have on SHIELD, Hydra, Captain Rodgers."

"And you."

He refused to be baited. "Yes."

For a moment, she worried her bottom lip with her teeth, and he could read from her glazed expression that she'd retreated within herself, as she had when he first brought her to this room. Fragments of other missions and old training rose to the forefront of his mind. It was difficult to retrieve information when targets entered such a state. Better to wait than waste his efforts on an empty body.

_Empty like you._

He wasn't empty. He was the Winter Soldier. He knew the man on the bridge. The man gave him another name. He wasn't empty – he was too many different things. He was… his mission could tell him. Or give him what he needed to unite the strangers within his own head.

He was not empty.

The mission's eyes focused on the floor, and she lifted them to meet his, hesitating. Whatever she had to say, he didn't think he'd like it.

When had he thought about liking his missions?

His likes and dislikes, his concerns, his feelings – none had been relevant. Only his orders. The mission. And now, suddenly, he suffered from them all, and he'd failed. His targets walked away. He failed to deliver the Compendium. He made his own mission, but there were no orders.

Unaware of the Soldier's confusion, the mission began to speak.

"I'm not sure you understand. I remember _everything_. I can tell you what the fifth stranger who passed me at the mall last week was wearing. I could even draw it for you. I can quote every book I've read, repeat every song I've ever heard. Recite conversations. Sketch every waking second." She shifted, frowning, some of her earlier confidence waning as her eyes slipped away again to rove the walls. "With the parameters you gave me, well, we could be here for weeks. When you say 'everything,' I don't think that's what you really mean."

The Soldier didn't believe her. His voice was blank when he answered. "That's impossible."

"I'm serious. Why do you think Fury trusted all his information with me? Do you give detailed images and schematics to a computer you can't rely on? Something with a faulty memory? If I couldn't do what I say, Fury's plan wouldn't have held water." She waited a moment, let him think it over. "You _know_ it's true."

Implausible as it seemed, the Soldier could see the mission was in earnest. And he couldn't think of a good way to test her assertions. They had no common history. She could say anything she wished, and it could take him days to verify the facts. Some things could never be verified at all. Taking a slow breath through his nose, he leaned back on his heels and studied the mission. From what he could tell, everything she'd said so far was true. When he held the knife to her throat, she shared plenty of information. He could check those things. Most of them, anyway.

Then, the mission surprised him. She straightened up and looked directly in his eyes.

"What's your mission here?"

"You're my mission." An easy answer.

But she shook her head. "I don't think so. I think _you're_ the mission. I'm just a tool. You need information, and I have plenty. But you don't even know what you're looking for. So you think you need everything. We just have to figure out where to start."

Her words felt cold, and the Soldier sobered as he absorbed them. The Soldier had two names. He knew he ought to remember things he did not. He couldn't always remember what he ought to remember; he only felt a blank where there should be… something. He went in circles. But those two names – he could start there. Forget the man on the bridge. _Steve_. Forget SHIELD. Forget Hydra. Find the _something_ behind those names. For one, the Winter Soldier, he had training, conditioning, the expectation of habit and repetition. Whatever he had been before, he must have been this a long time. And the other, Bucky, for that name, he had a longer name, flashes of a history he wasn't sure he wanted to remember but dreaded losing, and a man he'd failed to kill. A man who made a promise_. To the end of the line_.

But what was it the mission just said?

He felt one of his eyebrows twitch up. "We?"

The mission raised both her eyebrows in response. "You plan on letting me walk out that door anytime soon?"

"No."

"Well, there's your answer."

**A/N: HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! I had a red eye. I bought junk food. Flatmate made birthday brownies and gave me a sword. And I wrote. **

**Tomorrow I have to pack. Everything. Because, children, procrastination kills. **

**I love hearing from you guys! Thanks for all the support!**

**Replies to Anons:**

**MsMarvel: Thank you very much! I tried to do something different from the other fics I'd seen, and then the plot bunnies attacked. I hope you're still enjoying it, and thanks again!**

**Shrubby: Thank you! You flatter me. I like it. ;P**


	6. 6

**Disclaimer: I put a tracking chip in Hal, but the rest belongs to the big wigs.**

.6.

It had been a long, drawn-out battle in which Hal tried to reason her way through layers of ice to reach the Soldier's brain, and he retaliated with silent glares and the occasional "No."

That was his new favorite word. "No." Like she was his dog or a very poorly behaved child. Of course, if this man really was _Bucky Freaking Barnes_ – and every shred of data she possessed insisted he was – then she'd be more like his very poorly behaved _grand_child. Creepy, seeing as how he looked to be in his late twenties or early thirties. Unfair, seeing as how only the Doctor and Patrick Stewart could get away with hiding their age so well. When nearly one hundred years she reached, look so good she would not.

Her library had gone spastic. Still orderly, but unnecessary information kept jumping out at her, spines smacking her in the head, pages fluttering across her face. Pop culture references, mostly. Harmless distractions. Perhaps an unconscious effort to soothe herself. Because, no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't forget that every word with her captor was life and death. He could decide he'd completed the mission and snap her neck. He could decide the mission just wasn't worth it and snap her neck. He could get irritated and snap her neck – maybe he'd regret it later, but she'd still be dead. Or his unbalanced psyche could finally bow under the pressure of current events – and he'd snap her neck. To be fair, he could kill her lots of other ways. He'd demonstrated a real virtuosity with that knife, but whenever Hal let her mind slip, whenever she let the _what if's_ carry her away, she always came back to that gleaming metal fist curling around her throat, squeezing until every last twitch had ceased. Brutal. Efficient. Entirely plausible.

But, so far, she'd kept her neck intact. And, once again, she found it on the chopping block. Only, this time, she'd chosen to take the risk.

And so she found herself, after the battle they'd waged over the long (cold) night hours, walking down another dirty alley, roiling clouds threatening rain, trying to hide all her bumps, bruises, and blood. Between the wreck and the Soldier's interrogation, she looked awful. She looked awful, and her clothes had suffered almost as much as she did, so they didn't hide squat. But, she reminded herself, this was necessary. The Soldier even agreed (eventually).

The first issue they faced on their new mission concerned supplies and equipment. They didn't need that much, not immediately, but their priority must be to blend in. The Soldier couldn't hide in Hydra's secret nests anymore, and Hal could no longer pass herself off as the Invisible Woman in Plain Sight. They both required camouflage, and, quite frankly, Hal required food. If the Soldier's metabolism was proportional to his size and speed, then he needed food, too, even if he could ignore his hunger.

The Soldier agreed they needed these things. He disagreed about how to acquire them. Hydra hadn't left him with a lot of social graces, and simple theft seemed the most efficient method in his mission-driven mind.

Hal had disagreed.

"_Because thefts are reported, dumbass. And even if they aren't, someone would notice the stuff was gone. More eyes on the lookout are more you can't afford. Not sure you've noticed, but you have a metal arm. Tends to stand out, even in this day and age. The only way people won't notice is if you are invisible. And I only know one group of invisible people."_

_Frowning, he'd cocked his head, doubtless imagining something high tech. "Explain."_

"_The homeless. Even the people who notice don't really notice. Soup kitchens and such? They only remember your face if you become a regular." She gave him a moment before elaborating. "Lots of places offer free clothes and food. They don't ask a lot of questions, especially if you look the part, and, well," she glanced down at her torn and stained attire, looking back up to give him a laughing smile, "I kinda do. In and out. Half an hour tops. One stop and I can get us everything we need. I know this isn't something you'd choose, which is why no one will be looking for us there. I'll have to careful, of course, but it's easier to dodge hunters when they're looking the other way."_

_He'd chewed that over for a while, glaring at her in silence until he came to a decision. She couldn't do anything but stare back. She'd played her ace – speed paired with stealth – and if that hadn't sold him, nothing would. _

_When he finally spoke, he didn't break eye contact. "I'll be watching. Don't try to run."_

"_Don't you trust me?"_

"_No."_

"_No offense, but you look like you could use the sleep."_

"_No."_

"_You sure?"_

"_Yes."_

"_You could time me."_

"_No."_

_She opened her mouth to try one last time, but he closed the distance between them in two quick strides, clapping his metal hand over her mouth with his most severe frown._

"_No."_

A cold drop on her scalp startled Hal out of her reminiscing, and she looked up just in time for the ponderous clouds to burst.

And…

Perfect.

Well. She'd always wanted to rock the grunge look.

At least she knew he'd be getting wet, too, wherever he was. She couldn't see him, but she knew he was there. He didn't trust her to go by herself, so the only question was: which rooftop had he chosen to spy from? She wondered if he'd find some way of following her inside, ensuring she didn't make a call, or if he'd be able to keep tabs on her from without. He'd stand out like a sore thumb in the clothes he was wearing. With that arm. If he came inside and someone saw him, things were bound to get violent. Better stay close to the windows, then.

The rain strung her hair into tatty ropes, and she hoped the water would clean some of the blood from her head wound. Of all her injuries, it was most likely to inspire an unsolicited 911 call from a well-meaning volunteer. And, of course, initiate more violence.

She'd been careful to avoid thinking about the boys in the abandoned office. How they'd entered believing in their own invincibility and never had a chance to leave with their shattered comprehension. They would've hurt her, or at least some of them would have. Maybe because they were expected to. Maybe because they wanted to. Didn't matter anymore, because they were all piled somewhere in back of the building. The Soldier dragged away their corpses, leaving her with a glare that _promised_ all kinds of evil if she tried to leave. She hadn't left. Not when he'd been unconscious. Not when he stepped out of the room.

Instinct and memory led her to the nearest open soup kitchen. It sat beside a free store for clothing, all run on the charity of the towering cathedral across the street. Hal had never visited this one. She was glad. Somewhere at least, her anonymity lived on.

Smells of soup and fresh bread whispered through the soup kitchen's open door, and Hal's stomach rumbled appreciatively. But she didn't want to juggle (or spill) take out boxes over every available jacket in the free store.

Clothes first, she decided.

She pushed through the glass door, avoiding eye contact, stooping her shoulders, trying to minimalize her profile. One tall man with pale brown calluses over his hands and the first specter of glaucoma glazing his eyes stood at the central desk while a middle aged woman put his chosen jacket and a toiletry kit in a second hand shopping bag. Two women of indeterminate age milled through the racks, fingering baby clothes and soft knitted sweaters. One muttered under her breath to or about someone Hal couldn't see.

She stood staring at a small rack of men's clothes, trying to estimate the Winter Soldier's size. He wasn't excessively tall, but he wasn't at all short, and the boy was _ripped_, so maybe she should get something large…? She picked two button-up shirts and held them side by side. One could've been a medium. But the tag had a clear L. Did men's sizes vary as much as women's?

There was just so much wrong with this.

"Do you need help, hon?"

Hal jumped, but managed not to yelp, spinning around to find a handsomely wrinkled volunteer in a shop vest standing behind her.

A thousand possibilities leapt to mind, sparking instantaneous fear and hope. She could be working with SHIELD. She could be one of Fury's infinite connections. She could be _help_.

"S-sorry?"

"Oh, _I'm_ sorry," the woman smiled. "I didn't mean to startle you." She nodded toward the shirts Hal now held clutched to her chest. "Little big for you, aren't they?"

Way too big, actually, but Hal appreciated the woman's delicacy. The excitement quickly withered, leaving her shaky and disappointed. "They're not for me."

"Family?"

Hal didn't know how to answer that. She'd always been an abominable liar. So she gave a quiet hum the woman could interpret whichever way she chose.

"I see."

So she'd gone _there_. Ah, well. Hal saw the woman's eyes flutter over her tattered state, resting on her more obvious injuries. It didn't take telepathy to figure out what she was thinking. At least she didn't think Hal was anything special. Lots of girls living on the street paired up with a man – for safety if nothing else. The homeless had a high fatality rate in general, but women, especially young ones, usually saw the worst of assaults. From fellow homeless and random perverts alike.

"Take your time, honey, and let me know if you need anything." Offering a smile soft as cashmere, the volunteer stepped back and wound her way toward the muttering woman.

Hal sighed in relief. She even took a surreptitious glance over her shoulder to see if she could find the Soldier loitering in the shadows outside. Nothing. What had she expected? Still, that could've gone badly. She needed to move faster. One whisper to the cops could be the whisper Hydra overheard. Or SHIELD. If there still was a SHIELD. She took the larger shirt, reasoning the Soldier would want to wear it over his combat gear rather than removing the armored vest, selected a heavy black jacket, and snatched a baseball cap from a basket set above the rack. She couldn't be bothered with pants. She just – she had no idea. And his black combat trousers would blend well enough, anyway.

But she couldn't keep going around with one sleeve in ribbons and bloodstains spotting her attire. Far too conspicuous. On her way to the central desk, she paused by the women's section to grab a pair of cargo pants, a blue long-sleeved tunic, and a zip-front hoodie. She _missed_ her jacket. But she could mourn and hold a proper funeral for that later. Right now she was in a race against the Soldier's scant supply of patience. Maybe that wasn't fair. He was an assassin. He must have mounds of patience. Just not, apparently, when it came to her.

She threw her haul onto the counter and realized the woman who'd offered her help earlier had replaced the volunteer who'd been running the desk when she came in. Hal wondered if that was intentional. But the woman smiled and held her tongue as she put everything in two bags, and, antsy, Hal let her gaze roam the store. She barely noticed as the volunteer slid two kits of basic toiletries in with the clothes. With a final smile, the woman lifted the two bags for Hal to retrieve.

"Take care of yourself, and please come back if you need anything else."

Hal gave her own pinched smile in response. "Thanks."

She hurried into the soup kitchen, more aware than ever that time wasn't on her side. The man at the head of the line watched patiently as she crossed to him.

"I can't eat here," she said. "Is there any way I could…?"

"Sure thing." The man didn't ask any questions, just reached behind the counter and fished out a Styrofoam cup and take out box with lids.

"Could I possibly take two meals?" She held up the two bags, like they could explain better than she could.

"We don't usually…"

Suddenly, the woman from the free store exploded through a back door, and she swept up to the man with an air of authority. Hal realized they both wore wedding bands, and she wondered in passing if they were spouses. As she considered them, the woman whispered in the man's ear, and although she couldn't hear the words, Hal could make out the tone. Commanding. Determined. Chastising.

The man nodded and fished out another set of take out containers. Hal had never been so grateful for a busybody's interference. A line of frustrated teenagers doled out hot soup, turkey sandwiches, and an apple, loading the stuffed containers into a plastic shopping bag at the end. A simple meal, but Hal couldn't remember when a cup of soup had looked so delicious, or a turkey sandwich so alluring. She wasn't even going to get started on those apples.

Loaded with everything she'd promised to retrieve, Hal zipped back the way she came. As soon as she'd left the populated streets, a shadow detached from the rooftop and dropped a few yards ahead of her. The Winter Soldier rose, dour as ever, and Hal froze in place, waiting to see if he was angry with her.

"Twenty-two minutes," he said.

She smiled. "Told you I wouldn't be long."

He grunted, like they had a different interpretation of the word, and grabbed her arm with his bionic hand. He didn't take any of the bags.

"Where are we going?" They turned in the opposite direction of their old warehouse.

"Time to move."

Well, far be it from her to argue with the man with the knife.

**A/N: I moved. I'm still unpacking. I'm looking for a job that won't kill me. I'm juggling an extended family who's sharing the same house. I'm living in the literal attic and it's hot as Hades. Sorry I didn't get to do the first update this week, but I think I warned you... I think...**

**Anyway, Bucky's "No" thing was stolen from my nephew, who is two and uses this word whenever he gets grumpy. "Wanna play?" "No." "Wanna watch a movie with me?" "No." "Are you hungry?" "No." "Done with your plate, then?" "No." Seriously. That's a lot of negativity for one so small. **

_**WEEKEND CHALLENGE! Five reviews by tomorrow morning and I'll get another update out by Saturday**_**_ evening!_**

**Replies to Anons:**

**MsMarvel: Thank you very much! Yeah, plot bunnies. Gotta love the little ankle biters. Hope you're enjoying the ride!**

**Shrubby: Thank you, thank you! Bucky is still a struggle to write, but I'm glad you're enjoying it! **

**JC: Thanks for the review! Yes, now all we need is a choregraphed dance across some treadmills...**


	7. 7

**Disclaimer: I own enough crap to stuff one small U-Haul. That's it. The Marvel universe won't fit in a U-Haul. **

.7.

The clouds spat at them all the way to their new hide out. Hal wanted to take comfort in the fact that she wasn't the only one rocking the grunge anymore, but the stringy wet hair and the glistening slickness of the Soldier's exposed skin only made him appear more threatening. And he didn't let go of her arm. The entire. Freaking. Way. At least the true downpour held off until they arrived at their destination – another abandoned building in the part of down cops feared to tread.

Their new home was shaped more like a warehouse than the last mix of entry halls and office spaces, but apart from that … broken glass, scattered refuse, the tell-tale mouse droppings. Same old story. Hal couldn't help missing her apartment. Or, rather, her safe, dry, rodent-free bed. With sheets that smelled like lavender and a memory foam pillow.

No, the irony wasn't lost on her.

And her _kitchen_. A pantry and refrigerator full of food just waiting for some hungry hands to make a meal.

Thinking of hungry things, Hal realized she still hadn't eaten her soup kitchen lunch. The Soldier kept a hand locked around her arm as he searched the entire building, top to bottom, maybe made paranoid by their previous encounter with the gang. But no one was in, there was no sign anyone had been in for a long time, and the Soldier seemed to accept it. He brought them up to the second floor, a wide open space with only half a ceiling and a full compliment of pigeons. The man definitely had a thing for skylights.

Finally, the Soldier let her go. And he took the bags. At first, she thought he was finally showing a civil streak, but he carried them barely a step away before he all but upended them. She reigned in her squawk of indignation, trying to reason with herself. After all, she knew he didn't trust her. He was just checking. He didn't spill the food, either, a fact for which Hal was unspeakably grateful, and after giving them each a quick sniff-check, he chose the soup from one set and the box containing the sandwich and apple from another and set them in front of her. She snatched them up with a hurried, "Thank you" born from habit and dug in. The bag had two packets of plastic utensils and basic condiments, but the Soldier hadn't offered her any, and, besides, she was too hungry to mess with such things.

First, the soup. Hands trembling, she popped off the lid and brought the weakly steaming broth her lips. Ah, the wonders of insulation. Even after the dance through the rain, the soup was still hot, and the first warm mouthful – just salty enough with flavors of basil and rosemary – sent her into trembling exaltation. She moaned, eyes closed, as she held the first gulp. Oh, man, she'd gone to the wrong soup kitchens back in the day. She'd missed out. Big time.

She opened her eyes and found the Soldier staring at her, face animated with flabbergasted curiosity. Even a little… amusement?

Hal flushed and dropped her head so her hair would swing over her face. She could feel her skin flushing red as a tomato.

"Don't judge me," she muttered, drowning in her own embarrassment. She'd just had a foodie moment in front of her kidnapper. Could she make herself any more ridiculous?

The Soldier watched her a moment longer, and the corner of his mouth twitched up in what might – on any other man – have been a smirk. He froze, pressed his natural fingers to the spot, and then held them out for inspection, as if he expected his smile to bleed.

What level of badass must he be to expect his smile to bleed?

Or what level of damaged?

But the moment passed almost before it began, and when she blinked, she found him sorting through the bags of clothes. Hal folded her legs up under herself and hunched down with her soup. Just her and the soup. They were having a moment. The Soldier could go hang. But nothing could ever be that simple. Just as she settled back in with her meal, the metal hand swooped into view, too close for comfort, and Hal started back with a squeal, inadvertently sloshing her soup over her knees.

The Soldier didn't sound so amused anymore. "What's this?"

Recovering herself, Hal blinked at the card pinched between the shiny thumb and forefinger. It was… she blinked. It was the soup kitchen's business card, but someone had modified it with a number and… Oh.

_People who can help._

The little message had been scrawled in a hurry, and Hal recognized the number. She'd seen it on pamphlets at other soup kitchens and homeless shelters, on discrete little cards that could be hidden from angry boyfriends and violent families.

She cleared her throat, more embarrassed than ever. She tried to tell herself that was why her heart was beating so fast, not because she'd been sure he'd deck her.

"It's from the lady in the free store. She jumped to conclusions. Nothing to worry about." She took another sip from her cup, ignoring the way the soup splashed out on her hands, the way her hands shook too violently to control.

"Explain."

Fine then.

"She, uh, she thought it was a case of domestic abuse."

He glared at her, clearly expecting more, and she grudgingly continued. "She thought I had a boyfriend who beat me up or something."

"Why?"

She stared back at him. Surely her face could tell that story better than her words. It took a minute, but he got there. He nodded, the motion surprisingly jerky considering his usual grace, and went back to the bags. She went back to her soup, the joy of the moment lost. But it still tasted good, and when she got to the bottom, she tipped back the cup and tapped the side until all the vegetables at the bottom broke free and slid into her mouth. Mushy savory goodness, right there. She licked her lips out of habit and realized the Soldier was watching her again about halfway through the action. A lizard couldn't pull its tongue in so fast.

He'd divided everything into two neat piles, clearly a His and Hers, with the little packs of toiletries sitting on top, and now he seemed caught in the void between tasks. Hal would do just about anything to make him stop staring.

"Your soup will get cold."

She'd given him a task (indirectly), and he selected his own cup, popping the lid as Hal had and setting it aside. He stared into the liquid for a minute, brows cinching as he sought for the meaning of life bobbing between the vegetables, and Hal – deciding it was safe to continue her own meal – popped open her sandwich box. The noise drew the Soldier's attention, and he squinted at her.

Back to square one.

But he didn't just sit there; he got up and brought the soup, holding it in front of her face like he expected her to do something with it. It was her turn for the blank stare, and after a moment he got impatient and shoved it so close, it hit her nose. She squeaked and grabbed the cup automatically.

"What? You want me to test it for poison or something?"

"Yes."

She gawped, indignant, but afraid to mouth off when he stood so close. The cup still hovered in her vision, and she knew she didn't have a choice, so she swiped it and took a quick pull, handing it back when she was done. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand as he walked away.

"_Seriously?_"

He didn't dignify that with a response, only resumed his seat and commenced eating.

She ate her sandwich without much enthusiasm, eyed the apple, and decided to save the fruit for later. She had no way of knowing when they'd eat again. After all, the Soldier didn't seem as bothered by hunger as she was, whether he felt it or not was anyone's guess, and even though trips to a soup kitchen posed a fairly low risk, they still carried some chance of discovery, and she doubted the Soldier would let her go again until it was absolutely necessary. Oh, yes. And they had disguises now, which meant they had one less reason to risk a visit, making the gamble even less appealing.

Definitely saving the apple.

The Soldier took more time with his meal, biting, chewing, and swallowing with mechanical precision, but carefully, like it was all a new experience for him. Hal, however, didn't miss the quiet sounds of approval he made as he drank the soup. It wasn't just her, then. It was genuinely good soup.

While he was occupied, she took her pile of treasures from the free store and moved to the opposite corner of the room. She saw him watch from the corner of his eye as she grabbed them, but she chose a place squarely behind his back at the edge of the open ceiling before she got down to work with the toiletries. They had shampoo in there, and Hal was desperate to feel even a little more human. As they'd eaten, the rain had escalated to monsoon level, and a verifiable waterfall poured through the open roof – nature's showerhead.

Hal stuck her head into the rush, trying to forget all the bird turds probably washed along in the flood. The earlier rain probably cleaned off most of them. No reason to be so squeamish. The water was cold over her neck, and she squeaked, clenching her fists at her sides to stave off the shivers. In a moment, her hair was ready, and she hopped back to dry land, squeezing every last drop from the shampoo bottle into her palm. She lathered the soap into her hair, nearly purring as the grime and dirt of her adventures came foaming loose. Her head wound smarted, and she probed it carefully with the tips of her fingers to make sure the scab hadn't come loose, but it held firm, and she took her time working the stiffened blood from the rest of her hair.

Oh, yes. That felt better.

A little bar of soap came with the shampoo, and Hal rubbed it over her face and hands, wishing in retrospect that she'd washed before she'd eaten. As with her scalp, she approached her arm carefully, tenderly working the grit and old blood out of the healing cuts. It stung, but she was clean. And Hal didn't want to get gangrene and lose an arm, so she swallowed the pain.

Honestly, her face was the worst. The corner of her eye still hurt where the Soldier had teased her with the knife, but because she couldn't see it, she forgot it was there half the time. Whenever she touched her face, though, she bumped the scab, and when she applied soap, well, it _burned_.

Back to the rain.

Everything came slipping off with the suds, leaving Hal fresh, newborn. She knew, logically, that she hadn't been carrying around enough dirt to physically weigh her down, but as the grime rolled away with the bubbles, she felt lighter. As a janitor, she'd developed the fine art of washing. And not just floors. When she came home, every afternoon, she went to the shower before anything else and purified the day's filth. She emerged clean, bright, and willing to meet her eyes in the mirror. Granted, she didn't usually shower in the rain, but desperate times called for desperate measures. And it was actually kind of nice. Who'd've thought?

She stood soaking in the rain long after the suds washed out, combing out tangles with her fingers, trying to hold off reality as long as possible.

Then, of course, the hairs rose along the back of her neck, and she looked over her shoulder to discover the Winter Soldier watching her. She was fully dressed, but suddenly she was uncomfortably aware of how the water made her shirt stick, how her pants clung to her hips. Her peace washed away, following the stink and sweat. Looking down, she dropped her hands and hurried out of the downpour, grabbing the pile of new clothes from where they sat at the edge of the unnatural lake, and marching straight past the assassin.

"I'm going to change in the stairwell," she said, careful not to look at him. "I'm not running away."

She didn't check behind her, just pushed through the door – which hung precariously on one set of hinges – and trotted down to the first landing. She shucked her jeans and yanked on the cargo pants. She was afraid to think, afraid that he would follow her, afraid that she'd made a mistake. The way he'd watched her…

Like a memory.

Like something new.

Like he was enjoying himself.

She pulled her shirt up by the hem, momentarily blinding herself to the outside world as she fought to separate wet tunic from damp camisole.

He shouldn't like her. That was dangerous. She needed to be valuable enough not to kill, but not so valuable he'd regret losing her when she had a chance to leave.

And, frankly, she was afraid of him.

He'd already demonstrated his strength, and he'd been happy to take a knife to her face when he thought it was the most efficient way of getting what he wanted. What if he decided he wanted something else?

The shirt finally cleared her head, and she bowed to the overwhelming urge to check over her shoulder.

Of course.

He'd followed her.

He stood just inside the door, a full flight of stairs between them, but his eyes were fixed on her, and Hal suddenly felt trapped with her arms bound in her half-removed tunic. She tore herself free, all but flinging the shirt away, and yanked on her new one as fast as she could. Goosebumps covered her arms, partly from the cold, but mostly from the eyes drilling into her back. Even dressed, she felt vulnerable under that stare. She pulled on her hoodie and zipped it to her throat. As an afterthought, she flipped up the hood. Still not enough, but it would have to do.

She glared at him as she turned around, leaving her discarded clothes on the ground so she could stuff her hands in her sleeves.

"Need something?"

He watched her for another moment, his lips compressed in a tight line. "It's not safe to wander off."

"No shit." She shouldered past him – kind of like shoving past a brick wall – and returned to their sad excuse of a camp.

She was so very screwed.

**A/N: IT'S SO FLUFFY I'M GONNA DIE! **

**Wow, yeah, so Winter fluff. Didn't mean for that to happen, but it totally did. And then it turned into this weird moldy fluff with dark undertones that I will explain later, but if you've been paying attention you've probably already figured out. **

**Sooooo...**

**I'm doing Camp NaNoWriMo with friends, which means original projects will be eating more time than usual next month. Which means I won't be able to update as often. Which means...**

**_CHALLENGE!_ For the _rest of this month_ (which is, like, two days) I will update once for every five reviews I get. Do the math. Spread the word. Get chatty. Give me a good workout, people. **

**I'm insane.**

**Replies to Anons:**

**Sah: Well, thank you very much! You're English is very good! I used to tutor ESL students in university, and you have mastered the correct usage of "it's," so the worst is already behind you! Thanks again, and I hope you enjoy the rest of the story!**

**Sunshine: Thank you, Sunshine! I'm sorry - had to say it. Hal is FINALLY developing into something, and since I had no idea who she was when I started, I'm pretty happy with that. Thanks again, and I hope you're still enjoying the story!**


	8. 8

**Disclaimer: I own a yarn monster, an old music box that might be haunted, two octopus hair pins, a charmingly janky car, and none of the Marvel universe.**

.8.

Beautiful.

He'd forgotten that word, or its meaning. But watching the mission running her fingers through her hair in the rain, well, it roused that other voice, and it muttered – wryly – that Sergeant Barnes used to have better reasons for hiding with a pretty dame in an abandoned warehouse.

And yet, as he sat watching her from across the room, he kept seeing the little card hidden in the mission's new jacket. Someone tried to save her. Not from him, from some faceless brute who left those marks on her body.

But _he'd_ left those scabs. He'd taken a knife to her face and threatened to slit her throat. Some of the damage came from the wreck he'd hauled her from, but the majority came at his own hands.

He thought of the armed threats in their last shelter, how he'd known _instinctively_ to use the mission as bait. They wanted to hurt her. He'd seen men in his support detail become similarly excited in the heat of battle. They forgot their mission and turned their guns, knives, and hands on hapless witnesses for fun. The Soldier hadn't understood. But the echoes crowding his head remembered, and Bucky didn't like bullies. The Soldier put the mission, injured and unarmed, in harm's way. It had been logical. It had been efficient. She had not been damaged.

She breezed past him, and – caught in a tangle of memories – he did nothing to stop her.

The stairwell.

She was going alone to the stairwell.

Danger.

Bucky didn't let a dame walk home in the dark by herself. Didn't let her walk home alone in daylight, for that matter.

She was alone. She was in danger.

He followed, half-convinced he'd find more boys with bats ready to damage, destroy, erase.

When he saw her bare arms, he'd seen the collage of bruises mottling her skin, particularly on the right, where he most often held her. He used his stronger arm as a warning whenever he led her through the streets, a deterrent against any escape attempts. But he hadn't _meant_ to hurt her then. He knew his own strength. In order to be an efficient weapon, he _had_ to. He could crush a man's trachea or defuse a bomb. Or build one. Brute force wasn't his only _gift_. The bruises spelled questions he didn't want to ask. Had he lost control? Was he jeopardizing the mission? Did he even know what he was doing?

He'd never asked such questions. He'd never had a need.

And there was something else. Something bitter curling in his stomach and burning his throat whenever the mission forgot her damage, touched a wound, and flinched away.

_Guilt._

The voice named it. Another new sensation. He didn't like it. But he couldn't escape it, either. He briefly entertained the idea of altering the mission so he could strangle the girl and get it over with, but that didn't make anything better. The ache just clawed deeper. And –

he didn't _want_ to.

He dropped his head back against the wall, hoping to rattle his brain into better working order. Hadn't he seen men kick computers when they malfunctioned?

Captain Rogers, he suspected, could hit him hard enough to trigger a full recalibration.

.O.O.O.

Of course she had to take a shower a'la Disney princess with her shoes and socks on. Of course she splashed around in Lake Unseemly until every inch of canvas oozed rainwater.

So, of course, with night falling and temperatures plunging, she had to remove all her footwear or risk catching hypothermia. Maybe she was being dramatic, but her feet were _cold_, and going barefoot seemed worth the hazards of broken glass and mammoth splinters once the Chucks came off. She still shivered, but less, and if she folded her feet up under herself, they had adequate heat. At least she hadn't been kidnapped by an unbalanced super assassin in the dead of winter.

But taking off even that much reminded her of the new danger she'd invited into her precarious relationship with the Soldier. She felt naked, and no matter how deeply she burrowed in her hoodie, she couldn't shake the feeling of his eyes. Always watching. Constantly assessing. Usually stoic.

And he really was always watching. It went beyond creepy.

The sun dropped below the horizon, and the moon rose, but the city lights blinded the stars. Hal could look out the skylight to see nothing but inky black with dirty grey smudges of clouds reflecting the capitol's glow. A black hole to swallow her. If she fell up, she'd be gone.

Her head lolled against her shoulder, bouncing her awake, and she blinked wearily, shifting to get her blood moving again. She hadn't slept the night before. She could live without one night's sleep, but she didn't have the stamina for more than that, and she was out of practice.

Tired.

Just a wink or three. He hadn't done anything since she 'volunteered' to help him. Maybe if she just…

.O.O.O.

She crashed awake, driven by a primal fight or flight response, and socked the face hovering above her. Thick stubble raked over her knuckles, and she felt hard bone beneath her attacker's cheek, but the looming shadow stayed in place. Pulling her knees up, she kicked out where the groin should be, but the body over hers rolled to catch the blow on the abdomen. Her bare feet struck material way too hard to be muscle, and she automatically flinched back with a yelp.

Her attacker used the opening to drop a leg across her knees. She howled and scratched for the face, but the man – she'd hit facial hair – shoved her down with one impossibly heavy hand, forcing her flat on the crumbling cement. As her back hit the ground, the air left her lungs, and while she gaped for breath, she had a moment to catch up with herself.

She wasn't sleeping rough anymore.

This was an exception.

Fury.

SHIELD.

The Compendium.

The Winter Soldier.

Who now held her pinned to the floor with an _exceptionally_ disapproving frown.

Oops.

"G-good morning?" She peeped around, but the room was still black as night. And since half the ceiling was nothing but sky, she figured the sun hadn't risen yet. She couldn't even see the predawn grey that usually lit her way to work. So what…?

He was on top of her. In the dark. Alone in the dark. She closed her eyes. No, no, no, no, no, no.

_No_.

"What do you want?"

She blinked, frowned, tried to figure out why her voice sounded like a man's. Realized it wasn't her voice. Refocused on the man whose whirring cybernetic arm kept her pinned down like a bug in a display case. He hadn't grabbed. Barely touched at all. He'd already proven an exemplary member of the "What Personal Bubble?" club. She'd lashed out at him, not vice versa. All he'd done was defend himself.

Wait.

So he wasn't…?

She kept blinking up at him, dazed from her meeting with the floor, a bit breathless, and fighting the misty fingers of sleep stroking her brain.

"What?"

The Soldier growled low in his throat, but the noise was half whine. A sound of frustration, not anger. Shaking his head, he climbed off her, backing away like he expected her to hit him again. When he pulled back his hand, Hal could still feel the weight of it on her chest.

Hal wished she could see his face properly. But in the gloom, he was barely more than a silhouette. With the added distance, he seemed even more shadowed, and the darkness sat heavy on him, bowing his shoulders, dragging down his head.

"I think I…" he trailed off, carried away by daydreams, memories, or a runaway train of thought. But Hal was still afraid to move, so she waited out the silence as he gleaned words to express himself. "I don't know." His head tilted, then shook. Hal could see shadowy wisps of hair swinging around his head. "I don't _remember_."

He didn't speak for a solid minute, and Hal gathered it was her time to answer. "I got that. I said we'd figure things out. Figure out where to start. Do you remember that?"

"Yes, but – but do you want to?"

Hal went back to her tried and true imitation of an owl. Blink. "I wasn't under the impression that my opinion mattered."

"What if it did?"

Well, that was a loaded question, wasn't it? He might be testing her. Or maybe the Million Dollar Man was suffering a crisis of conscience. Then again, maybe this was his idea of small talk. Made sense. Instead of health and the weather, he went from knife play to twenty questions.

When she didn't answer, he shifted forward. Hal jerked up to her elbows, and the Soldier went still. Only when she'd settled again did he – cautiously – come a few inches nearer. It was still dark. But the first sickly bit of dawn leaked through the broken windows, and she could see his face. The weak light gave him an unnatural pallor, like a ghost, and his eyes peered at her, larger than she'd ever seen them – open, vulnerable, sad. This wasn't, she realized, the Soldier. "Do you want to help me?"

She tried to find the man hiding from himself in those eyes, wondering, if she looked long enough, if the answers would just rise to the surface. She always had the answers. She could always provide the key. But she wasn't the one who knew this man.

"I'm trying." She whispered. Still terrified, but in the pause between each adrenaline-laced pump, her heart hurt in the way a heart can only hurt for another. It had been a long time since she acknowledged someone else's damage. No one had needed that from her long before Fury taught her how to be alone. She wanted to explain, offer sympathy, but he was her kidnapper, and she was his hostage. As long as they held those roles, she could only help him so far. "I didn't know you. I don't have all the information you need."

He nodded. That had been the answer he expected. "But if you could."

"I wish I could tell you what you need to know. But I can only help you find the people who might be able to."

"Then…" His voice seemed to warm, just the slightest bit, and Hal wondered, suspiciously, if he'd had a plan all along. "That's what we'll do."

**A/N: REVIEWS! Holy crap! Where did ya'll come from? Sorry this update took a while (and it isn't as long as I'd like) but it's a) a bit of a segue between mini-arcs in the plot, and b) my dad keeps lying on the stairs and calling for me in cartoon voices. There are drawbacks to moving into your family's attic. My life is like an episode of _Full House_. Egads. **

**ANYWAYS, HERE'S A THREE-DAY BLITZ UPDATE! We hit the first five reviews last night before I even went to bed, and now we're up to eight, which means two more and I will pull a quasi-all-nighter to get the next chapter ready for morning consumption (lord willin', car runnin', and the creek don't rise). And, of course, if there are five more after that, I will get another chapter out by tomorrow evening. HUZZAH!**

**Comments and questions over the last chapter: I'll still respond to you all individually, but people brought up some good points I thought deserved group discussion. Like if Bucky is getting his old player skills back. Yes and no. He's gaining increased awareness of other people and a lot of the habits he used to navigate social settings in the old days. I don't think it's a coincidence that every time the Soldier lashed out emotionally in the film, people were present. Obviously, there are his interactions with Steve. But he also became extremely emotive in the bank vault (the "I knew him" scene). He was trying to explain his fear. To other people. The wrong people, but still people. Social interaction seems to be a trigger. And this is his first time being along with a member of the opposite sex he wasn't trying to execute, so... thoughts and thinking and things. Not necessarily acting on those, but examining them. Make sense? **

**And - yes - I've been spelling "Rogers" the wrong way. I think I read it in an article or something, and for some reason that spelling got stuck in my head. THANK YOU for pointing that out. From this point on, I will spell Cap's name the RIGHT way. **

**Replies to Anons:**

**Sah: Oh, thank you! You're so sweet. I'm blushing. I hope your sister enjoys it! Thanks again!**

**Shrubby: Hello, m'darling! Thank you, thank you. Hugs and such. We need to have tea or something soon. **

**GhostlyGuest: Well, thank you very much! I can do both - update AND enjoy Camp NaNoWriMo, I mean. I'm so, so happy you're enjoying the story!**

**Please feel free to ask questions! I enjoy them.**


	9. 9

**Disclaimer: I no own and you no sue, dooda, dooda...**

"So."

Steve Rogers looked across the table, feeling less than charitable.

"Tell me about this girl."

He was through pulling punches on Fury. The man would die before he told the whole truth. And now Bucky had some girl – some unarmed, untrained, _civilian girl_ – who carried vital intelligence for the survival of SHIELD, freedom, and the world. If he managed to get Bucky back, if they could piece his friend back together, this last smear of blood on his hands might just break him again. He had to protect Bucky from himself. He had to get back the girl. For all their sakes.

Just when he thought he'd reached the end of the rabbit hole, the White Rabbit dug just a little farther. He was tired. His people, Sam and Natasha, were tired. But the fight wasn't over. Not, apparently, by a long shot.

He preferred to use his head to solve most problems, and he'd always sparred with Fury in words, but he'd accepted the serum for a reason, and if he had to use his fists, well… he just might. It sure was tempting.

Fury gave a sigh that told Steve the man already had a neat stack of lies to deal, and that he'd only get the fragments of truth the spy deemed necessary. But not the whole picture. A compartmentalized file. His grip on the table tightened, and when he heard the first crack of splintering wood, he dropped his hands to his lap.

He was tired. But he was still in control of himself. He could do this. He could pull off one last mission before he slept again. For Bucky. Because he needed him.

"Not much to tell, really," Fury said running his fingers through the condensation on his glass. "Like I said, she's not an agent."

"Explains why you made her run the gauntlet after she took a vacation." Nat's slow smirk oozed like molasses, her husky voice almost gravelly with sleep. She looked down at them both from a corner of the room where she stood propped against the wall, arms folded, getting what poor rest she could. "Never thought she'd finish it."

Fury glared over at her with his one good eye. "That was the idea."

"Didn't look like this one panned out." Steve didn't even try to hide his disapproval, and Fury all but rolled his eye.

"What's done is done. We took a gamble. Things didn't go the way we wanted them to. She did me a favor, holding onto everything she did, keeping her head down. Just like I told her. Now she's missing, presumably because of your old war buddy, and besides having some _serious_ intel to recover, I have a debt to pay. I assume you understand what that feels like?"

From his place on the couch, Sam asked, "Why her, though? Maybe she wasn't an agent, but you had to have picked her for a reason."

"Of course I did." Fury turned his eye on Sam, and to the soldier's credit, he held the glare. "Haley Renold is an anomaly. She has flawless photographic memory. Everything she so much as glances over, she can remember with picture perfect clarity. Schematics. Timetables. Watch lists. If she sees a reel of surveillance footage, she can recreate it for you as a flip book. I've never seen anything like it before or since."

Steve's arms folded themselves, and he brought his full authority to bear as he condemned Fury. "You exploited her."

Fury did not, to Steve's surprise, defend himself. He released the glass and rubbed his water-slicked fingertips together, watching as they slid together, and apart, and together. "I did." Even Romanoff perked up at the confession. The faint slouch she'd fallen into straightened immediately to full alert, posture perfect, and her lips bowed. Her former boss, though, only looked at Steve as he continued. "I meant for her to hold my secrets. Somehow she ended up bearing an awful lot of my sins, too." Grunting, he rubbed a hand over his face. "You know what it's like, Rogers, to have a confidante? Your own private sin eater? I had my reasons – _good_ ones – but I won't lie. I liked keeping her around. Sharing the load. It was… addictive."

No one had anything to say.

They all carried too many of their own sins to cast the first stone.

It wound up being Fury again, who finally broke the spell he'd cast.

He downed the glass of water like a shot of whiskey and surfaced with his usual hard scowl.

"So what should you expect? Damned if I know."

.O.O.O.

"There's a special Captain America exhibit at the Smithsonian," Hal said, squinting at a flock of pigeons as they rose en mass from the adjacent roof. "I don't know how useful the information is, pretty basic stuff, but there are a lot of artifacts. Maybe one of them could jolt your memory?"

The Soldier paused in his examination of the clothes she'd provided just long enough to pass a cursory glance over his shoulder.

"Stay away from the windows."

Hal sank her hands in the hoodie's pockets and spun on her heel. "Sure."

She hadn't gone back to sleep after he startled her awake at the butt crack of dawn, but she felt like she was walking on sunshine. Her kidnapper gave a flip what she thought. What she _wanted_, even. He hadn't strangled her during the cat nap. And he hadn't tried to molest her. Sleeping or conscious. It must say something that a morning like that could make her happy.

Maybe she was going into shock.

Maybe he'd shoved her into the floor a little too hard.

Maybe she was just psycho.

Damn, she needed coffee.

Deprived of her view, she chose a half-rotted crate to sit on as she watched the Soldier fight with the long-sleeved shirt he was trying to drag on over his armor. She'd been right: he did plan on wearing it underneath. She'd also been right about the size. Any smaller and the unfortunate fabric would probably rip. But this one looked just right. If only it would stop getting hung up on the buckles.

The man's vest had more straps than a straight jacket.

He tugged on the snagged hem, mute in his aggravation, and Hal watched a button catch in a fold. But he just kept tugging, carefully, but in the same place.

How long had it been since the man dressed himself?

Giving up on the torso, he tried to stick his arm through a sleeve. Predictably, things did not go as planned. It was adorable, but in a terribly pitiful kind of way that made Hal feel more than a little guilty for enjoying the scene.

Enough was enough.

Popping off her seat, she sidled over and stood herself just inside his peripheral vision. He didn't acknowledge her, though she was sure he'd seen her approach, and she rocked on the balls of her feet.

"May I help?"

If looks could kill, she'd be a melted pile of sorrow on the warehouse floor. As it was, she waited out the death glare, eyebrows raised expectantly until he finally surrendered his hand. They both knew she couldn't hurt him. Even if she tried really, _really_ hard. But she could still feel him tremble when she slid her fingers up his sleeve.

Touch, she realized, must not be a happy thing in his recent memory. All fighting in public. Probably all invasive check-ups behind the scenes.

But he tolerated her examination, and once she'd arranged one set of sleeves to lie neatly over each other, he wordlessly held out the other arm. His face seemed hard as granite. But his eyes still held some of the softness she'd seen earlier, and they flickered from her face to her work as he absorbed this new process.

When she finished the second sleeve, she turned her attention to where the hem had looped and twisted itself around the details of his armor. And it was definitely armor. The pain in her feet was a constant reminder of that. She might've bruised the soles. She moved behind him slowly, careful to let him know where she was going. Giving him lots of time to adapt or stop her if he felt uncomfortable. He looked over his shoulder to keep her in sight, but he stayed still, even lifting his arms so she could fix the sides.

Hal stepped back and examined her work. The shirt hung well at the front, but one or two bumps betrayed the vest on the back. The jacket had been a good idea. She plucked it up from the floor and held it out. After a moment's quiet puzzling, he turned around and angled his arms back for her to slip it up his shoulders.

"Hold onto the cuffs of your sleeves," she murmured. "That way the jacket won't yank them up."

He did as instructed, and even though she had to stretch up on her tippy-toes, Hal got the jacket on him smoothly, tugging the collar up around the base of his neck.

Finished, she retreated to the space she'd privately designated Her Side and folded herself up at the base of the wall. The Solder touched his sleeve, brushed his fingers around the collar, and looked at her with the intently open stare Hal was learning meant he had something to say. Trouble was, he couldn't always piece the words together. So she suffered a lot of unexplained ogling.

"Could you please stop staring at me so much?" she asked.

Tugging on the strings of her hood, she broke eye contact to study the knotted ends. If she chewed on them, could she get away without answering that question?

"It makes me uncomfortable."

His face scrunched up in a clear picture of confusion. "Why? Don't people…" He stopped. Rethought his terms. "Don't you look at people?"

"Sure, I mean, a little, but my life lately has kinda hinged on not being noticed. And anyone would interpret too much staring as a nonverbal threat."

He frowned. "But I notice you. I can't un-notice you."

She waved him off. "Never mind. Forget I mentioned it."

"No."

"Huh?"

Not confused, but a little angry now, he turned around and headed toward what Hal imagined as His Side. They were both out of neutral territory again.

"I won't forget."

**A/N: Aw, poor Bucky. Guy can't have a regular conversation to save his life. And the fluff, my word, I can hardly find the document on my computer. Yeesh. You know what that means. INCOMING ACTION!**

**The reviews! The REVIEEEEEWWWWWSS! Whoa. I owe you another update! However, that will be the last of the Three Day Blitz updates. After that, I'll try to give you guys one substantial chapter a week through July (because I have other projects I've been ignoring that need my attention during Camp NaNo). But I won't disappear. I promise. Unless my nephew head-buts me hard enough to rupture something internal. Then I'll probably disappear. **

**See you in a few hours!**

**Replies to Anons:**

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**Sah: Thanks so much for the review! Oh, I understand. I was up until three working on this and decided to leave the end for this morning. Another short chapter, I'm afraid, and the one I plan to post this evening will probably be kinda short, too, but they'll be getting longer again. Thanks again!**

**Guest: Flattery will get you everywhere! Thank you so very much! I'm having a lot of fun writing this monster, and I'm extremely pleased you're enjoying it so much. Thanks again!**

**godthefeels: Thank you! Thank you, thank you! Well, hopefully that jealously inspires you to write more, too. And no need to awkwardly walk away. When one must leave, it is best to prance. Or strut. Or do the worm. Your choice.**

**Inkwriter: INKYYYY! Hope your competition went well! As for your question, this chapter touched on that, but I'll go into greater detail later in the story. Everything's connected. *Waggles eyebrows* Thanks again! **


	10. 10

**Disclaimer: I got 99 problems, but this fic ain't one.**

.10.

Six hours, one apple, and a few dozen blank stares later, Hal found herself on a busy street corner, staring up at a traffic camera, a ripped cardboard sign in her hands.

_Captain Rogers_, it read, _SHIELD's Compendium needs a lift._

When she was six, her parents took her to a small zoo with a large reptile house. The owners fed the snakes live mice, and one tank held a literal nest of vipers – Gaboon, to be precise. While Mommy and Daddy argued about whether or not it was appropriate to give the poor mice such a brutal – public – execution (and whether it was okay to have their daughters watch), Hal stared, transfixed, as the snakes each picked off their meals. For a while they didn't move at all, and the mice scampered, trying to find an escape. When they found none, they hunkered down, shivering. Only once the mice had gone still did the snakes made their move. The first strike was so fast Hal didn't even see it. One second, a snake rested with his head on a rock. Half a heartbeat later, he had his mouth around a little brown mouse's head. The mouse kicked and bounced, trying to fight free, but the viper just held on until, eventually, even the weakest twitches ceased, and the mouse hung limp from its fangs. Gradually, almost lazily, the snake worked the mouse down its gullet. It took the snake five minutes to swallow.

The other snakes took their meals with similar decorum.

But the handlers had miscounted.

All the snakes curled up, fat and happy with great bumps in their stomachs. One mouse, however, remained, panting in the middle of the cage. His very ears trembled, and Hal watched, sad and afraid, until her parents finally agreed the whole thing _wasn't_ PG rated, and dragged their girls to go look at some iguanas. She left the mouse alone, surrounded by predators, to meet its fate. Maybe it waited for hours. Maybe days. But, in the end, Hal knew the snakes would decide they had room for dessert.

She had a lot of empathy for that mouse at present.

After twenty minutes in the public eye the only response she'd gotten were some very confused looks. But she knew the threat she couldn't see was the greater danger. She could see nothing but civilians. Her heart fluttered. Her palms left damp prints on the sign.

What burned most was this was partially her fault.

Sort of.

She'd said she'd help.

It wasn't a secret that Captain Rogers had more answers for the Soldier than anyone else alive, but, honestly, the Soldier wasn't ready to face him yet. He needed to figure some things out before he attended any class reunions. Lucky for him, he didn't need to get his information face-to-face. He had Hal.

In order to talk with Rogers, though, she needed to go back to SHIELD.

The Soldier would have to return his stolen library book, but he didn't want to pay the fine.

The trick was getting Hal to the right people while simultaneously ensuring the wrong people didn't get to her first and giving the Soldier sufficient opportunity to put some distance between himself and Captain America. A messy affair. Hal wanted to just call the Captain again – the Soldier was a master assassin, pick pocketing some change shouldn't be an issue. But, of course, that would be too easy. Without a proper diversion, the Captain and his friends would sweep in, pick her up, and hop right on the Soldier's trail.

This was the Soldier's solution: stick her in a public place with a sign guaranteed to trigger any searches SHIELD still had running while luring any surviving Hydra cells into making a play for her, too.

She thought it was a shitty plan.

He didn't care what she thought this time.

So much could go wrong. Yeah, the Soldier was watching, keeping an eye on her until the cavalry arrived, but the whole scheme hinged on both SHIELD and Hydra getting her message. The battle over the Potomac hurt both sides, crippling regular surveillance and destroying plenty of operating systems. Hal didn't know who had better back ups. She didn't even know if SHIELD had any scans left running in the public sector. What if civilian police decided she was a freaky loiterer and tried sticking her in a cell? The Soldier wouldn't let that fly.

More casualties.

What if there wasn't enough left of Hydra to send out a team? If SHIELD found the Soldier, would he use lethal force to defend his autonomy? Probably. No, no. Definitely.

Even if everything went according to plan, SHIELD and Hydra would open fire in a civilian environment.

Hal could not, in good conscience, allow that to happen.

But she wasn't sure how to stop it.

No, that wasn't true. If she ran, there was a chance she could move the fight away from the main streets. She could minimize collateral damage, even if she couldn't prevent it.

She scanned the rooftops. She wouldn't find him, but she couldn't repress the instinct to look.

She couldn't let this happen.

Well.

No time like the present.

"Hey!" She flagged down a passing businessman. He looked at her like a stray dog he wasn't sure was safe and kept his phone to his ear. But he didn't completely ignore her. Hal widened her eyes as far as they would go. Innocent or insane, whatever she looked like, she figured it would trigger a response. "Can I have a pen?"

The man pulled one from a pocket inside his suit jacket and tossed it to her. "Keep it."

"Thanks!" She waved as he walked off, then dropped her sign and took a knee over it. Because the tip was designed for close reading on paper and not a miniature billboard, Hal had to doodle thick, scratchy bubble letters over the back. It took more time than she'd hoped.

When her new message was ready, she flipped up the reverse side and made a slow turn, making sure the Soldier, wherever he was, had a chance to read it.

_I want to help. _

Clear divergence from the plan. And while her message was friendly, it was also a warning. She was going to run.

And she did.

The cardboard dropped even as she turned, knee bent, and sprang that first step out of the plan.

She didn't want anyone tracking to lose her in the crowd – because hopefully they were from SHIELD – so she kept to the busier streets for a few blocks, ducking and dodging around civilians. Her shoulder caught on several more business folk, who shouted some exceptionally unprofessional words after her during her progress down the boulevard. A branching street of small, seldom-frequented shops opened on her left, and she turned away from the crowds.

She was giving the Soldier a choice. He could follow her, make sure she landed safely in SHIELD's hands, or he could take this window to move out before Rogers appeared on the scene. If he trusted her, he'd probably leave. The sign wasn't a lie. She did want to help. The Winter Soldier needed answers, needed the framework for his new identity, or he could become the most dangerous rouge asset in history.

If he could trust her, she could help him. As she jogged down the weave of back streets, she recalled her offer, the final piece of the plan.

Once she was inside SHIELD, she would need some means of communication with the Soldier. And he would need a safe house. Ideally, they would find a way to combine the two.

An idea had struck her, and she'd had to hurry to share it before she lost her nerve.

"_You can use my place."_

_Staring._

_Flushing._

"_I just mean – SHIELD will drag me off into some dark rat hole somewhere to debrief, and I'll probably be gone for a good while. You don't have a place to stay, I have enough food in the pantry to last a month or two, and going to soup kitchens on your own might be risky…"_

_The Soldier's lips puckered in a frown. "You want to take me home?"_

_An incredible wave of heat washed Hal's face, and she tried to hide it behind her hands. "No – I mean yes – I mean… I'm not taking you home. I won't be there. It's like a sublease."_

"_What's a sublease?"_

_The fact that his sentences were getting longer was lost on her. She groaned into her palms. _

"_Never mind." She took a deep breath, gathering her courage, and straightened up, miraculously managing to hold his eye as she spoke. "My laptop should still be there. I can send any information I gather to my email. I'll give you the password."_

_Carefully, he nodded. Hal accepted that as a 'Yes,' and went back to scratching her sign with the handful of old pens the Soldier had gathered. She almost missed the quiet words that came next._

"_Thank… you."_

She hoped he understood. The Soldier was sharp, but he was severely unbalanced, and she couldn't predict what he'd do now.

Her legs began to burn, and she wondered how much longer she could keep this up.

And then a bullet struck the display window she was passing. The glass didn't shatter, but it made a delicate ring, like wind chimes, as the bullet punched through. A chip found her cheek as she whirled to find the source of the noise, slicing across her cheek. Her hand immediately flew to the wound – shallow, thank god – and she almost stumbled over her own feet, discombobulated.

For a second, she thought it was the Soldier giving her a warning shot. He'd never miss. But before she could regain her momentum, a body slammed her into the adjacent wall, a body much too tall and lean to be the Soldier's. Hot breath hit the side of her face.

"Hail Hydra."

He balled a fist in her hair and used the grip to slam her temple against the bricks. She screamed and kicked for his knees. One heel caught him on the shin, but nowhere near hard enough to break bone. She got another meeting with the wall for her efforts.

Somewhere above them, a man screamed, and Hal saw something big tumble down behind the agent holding her to the wall. The body landed against the pavement with a crack, and Hal tried to pull back, squeezing her eyes shut.

What was she supposed to _do?_

A second shadow, far more controlled and graceful than the first, dropped down, and Hal caught a flash of silver before the blade sank into her attacker with the full force of the fall. The hand in her hair took her down with the Soldier's victim, and she scrabbled frantically with the dead fingers, tearing out chunks of her own hair in the process.

The Soldier took her by the arm and jerked her upright.

His face was absolutely frigid.

She raised her hands, palms out, hoping he'd let her get the words out before he strangled her. "I'm going to help. I swear I'm going to help you."

He glanced pointed at the bodies of the two Hydra agents. "This isn't helping."

She had to make him understand. This was a tipping point; she could feel it. The future would take shape in this little street, and it could very well be a future she wouldn't participate in.

"I know collateral damage isn't a big part of your calculations now, but someday it might be, and if I can prevent one of your first steps toward self determination being the provocation of mass killing, then I'll take the risk."

"It wasn't your call." Still cold. Not even patronizing.

Desperate – and a little angry – she exploded. "It _was_ my call! I'm not your mission. I'm not your assignment. I'm just as human as you are. My name is Hal. I don't like ice in my drinks, my favorite color is red, and I hate it when people stare."

He watched her, eyes blank, as he tried to reconcile the list of random information she'd dumped in his ears. Gradually, so slowly it barely happened at all, the chill left his face. Hal didn't know what out of everything she'd said had gotten to him, but she knew, for the moment, she'd live.

And maybe he could, too.

He opened his mouth to speak, and a familiar voice echoed down the street.

"Miss Renold? This is Captain Rogers. We're here to extract you. Miss Renold? Please respond!"

He wasn't in sight, but the Soldier turned to the voice, transfixed. Hal imagined she could see the echoes of memories gaining flesh behind his eyes.

"Does he know you're here?" she whispered.

The Soldier grunted. "No cameras back here. They're coming in blind."

"Then you can still leave." She reached out and set her palm over the star on his bionic arm. It was the first time she'd voluntarily reached for him, and it jolted him enough to win her his full attention. "Please. Trust me."

There was so much in his face when he looked at her. She could draw it over and over again, fill an entire sketchbook, and still not capture it all. But she'd remember. She hoped he would.

When Captain Rogers burst around the corner, Hal stood alone with her back to the wall, staring at the two bodies left at her feet. He rushed up to her, setting his hands on her shoulders as he sought her eyes.

"Ma'am? Are you alright?"

Hal sighed, tilting her head back until it touched the wall. It was the only way she could look in the man's face. She'd always been petite, but the world suddenly seemed full of unusually tall men.

"Captain Rogers?"

"Yes."

"I called you two days ago. You'd make a shit-awful cabbie."

**A/N: Oh my WORD. Sorry for the delay. You know what I said the other day about lord willin', car runnin', and the creek don't rise? Well, this afternoon the sister-in-law went into the hospital for a chronic - but unscheduled - issue. I got to baby-sit the two-year-old nephew. Then my mom, who went to the hospital with the seesta, got sick. Turns out she needs minor surgery. Joy. At least it's not major, but still. Seriously? The crap, karma. The crap. **

**So, long story short, there were problems. But now we're all safe and well and ready to move on with life. **

***I'm not sure I replied to all the regular reviews from chapter 8, and I'm sorry if I missed you, but if it's alright with you all, I'm just gonna call it even for this round. I. Am. Wiped. **

**Tomorrow begins Camp NaNo, which means updates will probably roll around on a weekly rather than bi-weekly basis.**

**But...**

_**REVIEWS FEED THE VAMPIRIC TREE FROG THAT IS MY MUSE.**_

**That is all. Carry on, my good people. Carry on.**

**Replies to Anons:**

**heroherondaletotherecuse: Thanks for the review! Ha! Glad you like the tie-in! It was a bit hit or miss, so I'm happy it works. Thanks again!  
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**Guest: Thank you! Yes! The fluff! IT'S SO FLUFFY I'MMA DIE! Thanks again!**

**Sah: Thanks! You are fantastic with a side of awesome. Your reviews are always so encouraging, and they've done a lot to keep me going over the past few days. Thanks again! **


	11. 11

**Disclaimer: I've got problems. How to spend Marvel's royalty checks isn't one of 'em. Drat.**

.11.

"Are you sure you're…"

"Fine," Hal snapped. "Completely, totally, definitely fine. And don't bother asking me again in five minutes, because I think I'll be just as fine then."

She could just see the tips of the Captain's ears turn red, and she felt an answering flush creeping up her neck. Sleep deprivation turned her into a monster. She needed a dark room and a relatively soft place to land. That was all. She was about as likely to get that as fans of _Game of Thrones_ were likely to get a happy ending.

Ever since Captain _Freaking_ America escorted her out of the backstreets – constantly peering up at the rooftops, like he could summon his old acquaintance with the power of his star-spangled will – Hal's adrenaline had begun to ebb. Now she clung to the man as he powered along on his motorcycle, growing limper by the second. The snark came from the fight side of her fight or flight instinct. Since her legs had called it quits for the day, all she could do battle with was her tongue. But Cap wasn't her enemy. He really did mean to help. He genuinely gave a shit. And when she was more conscious, Hal would apologize. But for the moment… the guy really needed to take a chill pill.

Every time they rounded a corner, he'd ask how she felt. Whenever they hit a red light, he inquired if she needed medical attention. The spaces in between were filled with the tense silence of a Man With Questions.

Hal, of course, had answers. She always did. But she hadn't decided yet which ones belonged to Steve Rogers, and which belonged to James Barnes. Those answers could wait until she'd had some sleep, or her foggy mind could misinterpret the information in her library.

That excuse probably wouldn't work on Fury, but Rogers was a nice guy, and nice guys couldn't say no to a sleepy girl with evidence of violence written over her face. Dealing with Fury was an art long mastered, one she could possibly execute in her sleep.

She might just try that.

As they drove, she happened to look up, and for an instant she thought she had died in some fiery accident, because an angel in combat goggles was winging his way overhead. Then Project Falcon sprang to mind – wings, jet propulsion – and she felt a little surer of her continued existence.

No idea what a decommissioned project was doing escorting Captain America, though.

Eventually, long after they'd left the city proper behind, Rogers turned off on a long drive. Hal struggled to keep her seat as they bounced through pot holes deep enough to swallow a minivan, and bit her tongue when a surprise bump sent the bike dancing. In spite of the road, Rogers was actually a pretty good driver. Hal supposed she shouldn't be surprised. He'd driven rougher vehicles over worse roads in the foggy decades before her parents were twinkles her grandmas' eyes.

She tried to reconcile this man with the fearful specter the Soldier held of him. Where the Soldier must sense authority and shadowed history, Hal saw confusion, pain, and desperation. Without that iconic uniform, he couldn't hold himself together. He'd locked himself inside it. Hal knew his file well. Fury updated it almost daily. Hal had always hoped to see Roger's list of known contacts grow, maybe even find evidence of a budding romance. But where Cap ended, so did Rogers.

Captain America, she decided, was much more human up close, for all the rippling abs she could feel beneath her clenched fists.

The bike leapt forward, gaining sudden traction after a sandy dip, and Hal nearly flew off the back. She compensated by flattening herself against Captain Roger's back and squeezing her eyes shut.

Oh, wow. She really hated motorcycles. Almost as much as she hated brussel sprouts. Never again. Never, ever, ever.

No motorcycles. Life was short enough without tempting fate.

And no brussel sprouts, because life was too precious to waste on tiny cabbages.

She hoped the Soldier didn't like brussel sprouts, because he sure as hell wouldn't find any at her place.

Captain Rogers cleared his throat, and she abruptly realized the bike had stopped. Her eyes popped open, and she yanked her arms back like she'd been hugging a cactus.

"Oh my – I'm so sorry – I just… 'M sorry."

"Not a problem." Climbing free of the vehicle, the Captain turned to give her a sunny smile honed by more than his fair share of reporters. "Just figured you'd want to get off that thing as soon as possible."

With a grunt, Hal hopped – one-footed – until she'd cleared the opposite side. The bike stood between them, a convenient wall. Too bad they could both see over it. She was really, really tired of being looked at. Solitary confinement sounded like a reward.

The house Rogers had brought her to was in the awkward range of 'outdated.' Too new to be old; too old to be new. Just ugly with appliances that would function slowly enough to drive a twenty-first century girl crazy. No one would look at this place and think it was a safe house, which was why Hal knew it was one. She had no file to prove it, but since HYDRA had compromised all their existing retreats, that was no surprise. SHIELD's remnants were already at work.

One small step for SHIELD, one long-ass ride for Hal-kind.

Captain Junior Birdman, who'd gone on ahead when they were a few miles from the house, stepped out on to the front porch. Hal wobbled, surprised by her legs' determined protest against supporting her full weight.

Bad, bad bike.

"About time you got here," Angel/Birdman said. Hal blinked. He was smiling at Rogers, trying to lighten what he perceived to be an incredible awkward mood. Easy. Casual. He did this professionally. But Hal knew that already. Sometimes, she felt like having her library was cheating.

Captain Rogers responded with the ease of familiarity, though his laugh didn't relax the tension in his shoulders. For such a public figure, Rogers wasn't all that good with people. "Some of us have to the take the low road. Did you get everything ready?"

Hal snapped to attention. "Get what ready?"

"Just some first aid supplies," Angel/Birdman rushed to assure her. "You seem okay, but we need to check things out. Just in case."

If he weren't so polite about it, she could almost be offended. "I'm not in shock."

Angel/Birdman would not be swayed. "Just in case."

With that out of the way, he tromped down the stairs and held out a hand, face all but glowing with a smile. "Nice to meet you. I'm Sam..."

"Wilson. Project Falcon. I have your file."

His smile died just a little bit, wilting around the corners like a houseplant left in the summer sun, and Hal regretted opening her mouth. She always had the advantage of people. They never liked it. She needed sleep.

"I'm sorry."

"Hey, don't worry about it." He swung an arm behind her, though he was careful not to actually touch, and guided her toward the house. Rogers stood to the side, examining his keys.

So that was how things were going to be.

Inside, Wilson sat her down on a couch that had seen better days and pulled up an ottoman. Hal was surprised it didn't collapse under his weight. The medical supplies were all arranged and waiting on the seat beside her, everything from disinfectant to band-aids to needle and thread. Wilson examined her thoroughly, discovering the head wound from the accident and the scrapes where the Soldier threw her against the wall. Her upper arms sported rings of finger-shaped bruises, and Rogers – lingering in the doorway – winced at the sight. No doubt picturing his old friend's hands making those marks.

Wilson disinfected what he could and patched her up, making quiet noises under his breath that was almost humming, but almost speech at the same time. Hal might have derived more comfort from the rumble if she didn't know it was only for her benefit. The man knew what he was doing. Unfortunately, so did she.

Once his literal wingman had finished, Rogers stepped into the room, like he needed to wait until his friend's damage was covered before he could engage the victim.

Hal looked him straight in the eye. Enough fondling. She wanted all this over with.

"Where's Fury?"

Wilson snorted; Rogers looked away.

"Not sure," Rogers admitted. Gradually, he inched his eyes back to hers. "He sent us the footage of you on the corner, holding the sign, so one of his people must've picked it up."

"Did he say when he would meet us here?"

Awkward silence.

"I'm not sure he's going to." Rogers rubbed the back of his neck. Apologetic.

"So…" Hal looked between the two men, flabbergasted. "What does that mean? What am I supposed to do here?"

"We're… not… sure." Wilson shrugged. Just as clueless as Rogers, but so much more open about it. Hal liked that.

She addressed her next question to him. "If you don't need me for anything, why'd you guys come after me?"

Wilson blinked. "Because you needed help."

Bull.

Hal glanced at Rogers. "Really. That the only reason?"

Captain America flushed like he'd been caught in a lie, but it only took him a few seconds to get a hold of himself. This time, he said what was on his mind. "You've been with the Winter Soldier for two days." Saying that name cost him. The words clearly stuck to his tongue, and he all but spat them out. "He's my friend. He doesn't remember, but…"

"He's James Barnes."

Both men were taken aback.

"How do you know that?"

Eyebrows up. She pointed at her own face. "Compendium.I know everything. Had Barnes' file. Saw the Soldier's face. It's the same face. Didn't really take rocket science, Captain."

"Right… right." He shook his head and continued. "You know more about his current condition than anyone. If you're able to talk about it, I really need to know what happened."

Hal sighed and sank back into the couch. "You need to know what happened whether I'm able or not." Some things never changed. They needed her for information. Just like Fury. Just like the Soldier. At least she knew where she was useful. "Lucky for you, I'm whole and hale and ready to talk." However, at the moment, she was serving two masters. She leaned forward to rest her elbows on her knees. "But I need something from you, too."

Wilson, who'd retreated a bit after remembering her role as the Compendium, rejoined the fray. "Yeah? What?"

Hal caught the Captain's gaze and held it until she was sure she had his full and undivided attention.

"Captain Rogers, you have information. Someone wants it."

.O.O.O.

Hal couldn't believe it.

Captain America was a diva.

Well, maybe that wasn't fair. He wanted what was best for his friend. He just had his own ideas about what that meant.

Who was she kidding?

The man was a diva.

He'd said _no_.

Hal asked to record an interview with him and hand off all his stories of Bucky Barnes to the recovering Soldier. Rogers said no.

"_This isn't about the information,"_ he'd said. _"We need to meet face to face. I can tell him whatever he wants, whatever he needs. But right now that's the only ace I'm holding. If I give him what you want me to, he'll never talk to me."_

Hal had lots of things to say about that. But she kept most of those things to herself. He wasn't interested in that information. No one ever wanted the whole story. Just the pertinent details. Her opinion never seemed pertinent.

But she was a bad liar, so even though she didn't use words to convey her displeasure, it seeped into her face and her body language. Before long, Captain Rogers found a reason to leave the room. Wilson took charge again, trying to pry loose a smile with pleasant banter and affable manners. But Hal was tired, upset, and determined to stay mad. So Wilson led her to a room on the second floor with a bed she could use, and she barely took time to say "Thank you" before she face planted.

Finally.

Warm. Safe. Comfortable.

And…

Couldn't sleep.

She rolled on her side and stared at the wall.

Why hadn't Fury left any orders? Wasn't this the time Fury kept her for? Because he'd survived with all his secrets, had she lost her purpose?

She almost died.

She'd been kidnapped, and then kidnapped from her kidnappers.

Hurt. Threatened. Scared.

Didn't he care?

That… hurt.

He didn't allow her to have friends. He'd guided her life decisions for years. It must not mean as much to him as it did to her.

She buried her face in a pillow and screamed until she fell asleep.

.O.O.O.

When she woke up the sun had vanished, and only inky dark showed through the cracks in the blinds. Her eyes itched, and the thin crust of salt refused to go away, no matter how much she rubbed.

She swung her legs over the side of the bed and toyed with the idea of going out and confronting Rogers.

As she weighed the advantages of waiting versus taking the super soldier head on, a pair of headlights pierced the blinds and swept around the room. She froze. A new variable.

Had Fury come to see her after all?

The engine growled to a halt, and a car door clapped shut. Crisp footsteps marched over the gravel, echoed on the wooden porch. Two knocks.

She assumed the men had moved into a defensive position downstairs, in case of a fight, but she heard the door squeal almost before the visitor finished knocking. Indistinct voices carried up the stairs, and Hal recognized the visitor as a woman.

"Didn't expect…"

"…ised?"

"… all the… us?"

"You…d… good books lately?"

"That's none of… ness."

"How…"

"Or…"

"Sh… later."

They were trying to be quiet, but the men didn't sound happy. The tone was almost… defensive.

Not enough information. She needed to know what was happening.

She rose carefully from the bed. Gingerly, she crept around toward the door, padding barefoot over a ratty throw rug. A board creaked underfoot, and the voices went quiet.

Well, shit.

The visitor said something, smug, louder than the rest of the conversation. Hal thought it might be, "Sounds like she's up."

Footsteps on the stairs. She didn't move as they came down the hall and a shadow cut through the light seeping under the door. The door swung open, revealing a smirking redhead. Hal didn't need an introduction.

"Agent Romanoff."

The Black Widow smiled. "Nice to meet you… Hal."

**A/N: Grumpy Hal is grumpy. I don't see her getting along well with Cap because he's too... polite. In the closed sense of the word. Hal doesn't know how to chase after information. It's usually handed to her pretty directly. So when someone won't just say what they mean, it irritates her. Ambiguity is not her thing. But Sam is a very honest soul. At least in the film. So I see him having an easier relationship with Hal, even if she freaks him out just a little bit.  
**

**Sorry for the delay. Life conspired against/for me. Got an unpaid part time job writing for a local nerd association which has some delightful incentives and a lot of exposure for new little writers like me. Another family member landed in the hospital. Decided to launch a cottage industry with my sissy. Had an anxiety attack/stomach bug/alien possession that landed me in bed two days.**

**That's my excuse.**

**However, since I sorta missed a week, I will make it up to ya'll with a _Challange!_**

**_Six reviews by tomorrow morning = update before I go to bed Sunday night/Monday_ morning.**

**Let's do this!**

**Next chapter WILL have Bucky POV. And someone none of ya'll expect. Spoilers...**

**Replies to Anons:  
**

**GhostyGuest: Why, thank you! I figure if I have to write a disclaimer, I might as well have fun with it. Glad you enjoy them! My word, you're good at flattery. As for your question: this is a creative outlet. I get to play with other people's characters, and I get to talk to people with the same interests. And Shrubby. She is very responsible for getting me to post this particular story. It's, in part, a gift fic. Thanks again!**

**Sah: Thank you very much! Awww... you're sweet with your reviews, so it's very easy to be sweet back. This chapter wasn't as intense, but I hope you still enjoyed it. Sorry for the wait! And thanks again!**

**Inkwriter: Inky! Yay! Thanks for both reviews! Well, I didn't take two months, but it's been pretty much two weeks. Oops. Weird or not, I'm glad you liked the mice/snakes story. You got the first dose of interaction with Rogers and Wilson in this chapter - hope you liked it! More in the next chapter! Thanks again!**

**Shrubby: Hello, deary! Huzzah! Glad you like Bucky's POV. He's still tricky, but the better grip he gets on himself, the better grip I get on his brain. I drink a lot of coffee before I write his stuff... Hal is starting to grow on me, too. Glad you're enjoying it so far! Miss your face!**


	12. 12

**Disclaimer: Me no own, and you no sue.**

.12.

Hal decided she liked being the center of the Black Widow's attention even less than she liked the Winter Soldier's scrutiny. When Captain America looked at her, he was perfectly polite, but deep down inside, he really didn't give a crap. He cared about justice and morality and truth of a thing, but when he looked at Hal, he saw a route to Bucky. She had kept her comfortable skin of invisibility. The Widow, however, had a much more objective gaze, affected by none of Roger's subjectivity, and she kept Hal pinned with it.

Romanoff strolled around the room – checking for bugs, Hal presumed – letting the aching silence do her work for her. The woman was a master interrogator, and Hal could read the questions locked in the measured stride of her pace. Fury never said more than necessary. The Widow had her name, and she must know her purpose as the Compendium, because the simple fact that she'd gone into interrogation mode meant she was looking for answers.

Hal sat on the bed, hands folded in her lap, face sour.

This was getting old.

"Fury says hi," Romanoff said. She'd calculated her voice to seem friendly. Hal wished she wouldn't.

"He couldn't say so in person?"

Agent Romanoff glanced over her shoulder, and the sympathy pulling her mouth into a sad frown was genuine. It didn't make Hal feel any better.

"He's busy." She resumed her stroll. "Headquarters ground to rubble. Hydra conspirators still at large. The remains of SHIELD to scrape together… I'm sure you understand."

"Of course." Hal looked out the window, fixing her eyes on the sickly fingernail moon as the mattress dipped under the Black Widow's additional weight. "So what are my orders?"

"Come with me to a secure location where you can debrief with the new director of SHIELD."

She turned to the Widow. "Fury's resigned?"

"More like he changed career goals." Romanoff shrugged. "But, I guess you could say that. Wasn't like he could keep the same role he had before all this went down. It's a whole new world."

"I guess so."

The world recreated itself every year or so these days. A scientist went all Mr. Hyde on Harlem. A billionaire designed a nearly indestructible armor and flew around like a superhero. A World War II hero woke from decades of hibernation in a glacier. Aliens invaded New York.

Hydra blew up SHIELD.

Aside from direct personal threats, Hal found little could shock her anymore.

"When do we go?"

"Whenever you're ready. I have a quinjet waiting a few miles out." Romanoff paused, as if she was uncertain whether or not she should voice her next thought. "I know you feel like Fury abandoned you. But he does care about getting you to a secure location, putting you with people he trusts. From him, that's a lot."

Hal answered softly. "He cares about protecting the Compendium. As he should." She stood up, and Romanoff watched her, utterly still. This was her move.

"Let's get moving."

.O.O.O.

The place was strange. The Soldier felt as if he was sitting inside his mission's mind, violating her life with his mere presence. He assassinated people. Broke into their homes and offices. Peered through windows with the eagle eye of a sniper's scope. This should not be strange. But it was.

Because, despite the constant reminders of the mission's feminity (scented body wash and shampoo, special facial scrubs, at least three brushes scattered through the house, the rows of nail polish on her dresser), he found little evidence of a life beyond this apartment.

Her walls were filled with bookshelves and racks with slim cases he learned held recordings of films. Sketchbooks gathered in stacks on end tables. Two chairs by a breakfast table in the kitchen and an overstuffed couch in the living area provided the only seating. Although her pantry and refrigerator overflowed with diverse, high-quality foodstuffs, she had no more than three plates.

Her scent hung heavy in the space, the sort of smell impossible for the owner to pick up, but a clear mark for a stranger to her rooms.

The Soldier almost felt as if he occupied a space inside the mission.

He found it… disconcerting.

He didn't sleep that night.

Afraid agents of Hydra or SHIELD would burst through the door at any moment.

Afraid of the vacant intimacy of the apartment.

Afraid of the ghosts learning to speak inside his head.

Afraid.

The Soldier didn't know how to be afraid.

The sensation choked him, filled him with jittery power he could not bind to the purpose of his mission.

Afraid of the past.

Afraid of the future.

Afraid of a girl.

Afraid of a friend.

Afraid of himself.

**A/N: First off - thank you. You all rock in ways I will never deserve. You might notice that this chapter is unseemly short. That's because the family member who was in the hospital last week went back in this morning, so my afternoon/evening kinda disappeared. But you got a taste of Bucky! And I have a plan...**

**This week, I'm going to try to get 1000 words on this fic per day, which means by Saturday I should have a REALLY nice update for you all. **

**Anyone figured out who's about to make an appearance? Anyone? Anyone? I kinda already told you in this chapter, but only if you were paying attention...**

**I will respond to anon reviews in the next chapter. I'm really tired, and I need to get stuff done tomorrow.**

**Thanks again!**

**Ta.**

**Cuckoo...**


	13. 13

**Disclaimer: Old rich men own the Marvel universe and its characters. I'm a hot young she-thang, so I guess that means I only own Hal.**

.13.

Hal sat in the back, like luggage.

She didn't complain.

Despite her rest at Roger's safe house, she felt bone weary, exhausted by the soul-sucking void of struggle without a goal.

She'd barely spoken to Wilson or Rogers before she left. The Widow led her downstairs, and the two men were there waiting. A tension that bespoke old issues and new problems simmered between the Widow and the safe house's residents.

Apparently, Rogers still thought she needed saving.

"You sure you're ready to go?"

"Like I said, I'm fine."

Rogers frowned. "Yeah, well, in my experience, when women say they're fine, they usually mean something else."

"It's your choice," Wilson said. "But if you need us, just call." He wasn't paying attention to either of the Avengers in the room. His attention was all Hal's. It brought on a rush of gratitude that nearly culminated in tears.

"Thanks," she murmured. "I'll keep in touch."

Steve tried to smile, but it looked pinched. "Make sure you do."

And they left.

A short drive brought them to the field where Agent Romanoff had put down the quinjet.

Boarded. Locked. Loaded. Ready to roll.

Hal had taken showers longer than it took Agent Romanoff to get her mission airborne. Made her a little insecure about her personal hygiene habits, actually.

Once they'd reached cruising altitude, Agent Romanoff put the craft on autopilot and slipped through the open door into Hal's Shipping Center. The redhead cleared her throat, but Hal chose to pick at her harness rather than be dragged into an uncomfortable conversation.

"You did good, you know."

Under the cover of her hair, Hal rolled her eyes. Yeah. Sure. She wasn't dead. That was her only real job description. Well, that and Don't Tell Anyone Anything.

The Black Widow pressed on, beating relentlessly against Hal's stony silence. "If you don't believe me, fine. But you deserve to hear that, at least once."

Keeping quiet now would just be rude. Hal swallowed her pride and gave a tentative little cringe with her face, aiming for what she hoped was a thankful expression. "Thanks."

"I mean it." The Black Widow crossed her legs, lending her an air of professionalism. Seductive professionalism, but still. "Someone else might've cracked. The Winter Soldier is… something else." She touched her shoulder, lightly, and if Hal squinted, she could just make out the faintest lump of bandaging under the catsuit. "What you have gives you power. All that information? It would've made sense to trade a few secrets for your own survival."

"How do you know I didn't?"

"No offense, but you're an easy read. And you take your job seriously. If you'd broken Fury's trust, you'd feel guilty, and I would see it."

Hal fell into an outright sulk. "I'm really that easy to read, aren't I?"

A smile fluttered over the agent's face. "Yeah." She shrugged. "It's not necessarily a bad thing."

After that, Agent Romanoff, satisfied with her work, meandered back to the front, donning a headset to communicate with ground control and adjusting a few levers.

They only flew another hour or so before Hal felt the jet tilt into a gradual descent. She watched the harnesses across from her swing empty, lifeless, and wished she had a window to stare out of. The Black Widow had been a bit patronizing. But nice. And everyone patronized Hal. She absorbed information, but, like a child, no one expected her to make any use of it.

And yet – she'd been the one to get through to the Winter Soldier. It was an epiphany, and the empty seats around her disappeared as her library opened. Tomes fell into her hand, eager to be read. Records of the Soldier's face from their first meeting in one alley, to their latest in another. His voice. Questions. Touch.

A couple days, and she'd touched him. Quite literally. He was still terrible damaged, but no longer isolated in his suffering. When he demanded the Compendium, he'd been locked inside his mind, aware, perhaps, of how easily an outside force could destroy the fragile awareness he was coming to grasp. He hadn't gone to Steven Rogers, even though he was the only clear and living link to his past. He hadn't gone back to Hydra. He hadn't gone to SHIELD. He'd taken a vulnerable source of information off the street, expecting answers, and even though she hadn't been able to give him everything he wanted, that shred of vulnerability, that _expectation_, had cracked the armor cutting off the world around him. Little by little, understanding bled through.

If he went to her apartment and waited for her to contact him, she'd know for sure that she was right.

Closing her library and drawing back into her actual body, she smiled.

An easy read.

Not necessarily a bad thing.

.O.O.O.

Hal had no idea where they'd landed. The view through the open loading ramp didn't give her much help. Agent Romanoff stepped up beside her and cocked an eyebrow, tilting her head to see more through the hatch.

The agent cleared her throat. "Homey."

Cement walls and a few looped cables. A barebones hangar. Hal gave the agent her most dispassionate look.

"I'm sure the guest quarters are much nicer."

Yes, because a couple flat pillows could make her forget about the locked doors and security cameras.

"Oh, yeah. This is just the garage."

Hal jumped at the voice. As she got a grip – and realized the Widow hadn't so much as blinked – a young woman appeared, strolling into view around the side of the quinjet. The newcomer stopped at the foot of the ramp, popping her fists on her hips and grinning like this was the most fun she'd had in weeks.

"Agent Skye."

The rookie was stretching her wings.

Rather than blanch, stammer, or act like Hal had grown a second head, Skye beamed just a little brighter. "You know who I am?"

"She knows all SHIELD personnel," said Romanoff

Skype gawped, taking in the second visitor. "The Black Widow?"

"In the flesh." Agent Romanoff didn't seem too tickled with the fanfare. In her line of work, recognition equated a death sentence. A thriving fanbase probably wasn't on her wish list. Hal had seen action figures of her after the Battle of New York. According to her file, that was one reason she'd started straightening her hair.

"Oh… my gosh. No way. You're the Black Widow."

"I think we've confirmed that."

Hal decided to intervene on her… colleague's… behalf. "Fury sent me here so I could be debriefed as soon as possible." She glanced around the empty hangar. "Should we get started, or…?"

"Right!" Skye clapped. "Sorry." She cringed, offering both women an apologetic smile before she held out her hand for a shake. "Like you said, I'm Skye. The Director -," she said the title with pride, "- said we were getting an important guest, but he didn't have a name. So you are…?"

She hadn't had so many people ask her name since that one time she tried to order a coffee from every Starbucks in D.C. in the same week. After she gave the new Director everything he needed, she would take some quality time and find a hermitage in northern Canada or something. Too many eyes. Too much attention. Not enough space. But for now – she took Skye's hand and did her best to look friendly. "Hal."

"Nice to meet you." Skye gave her arm a pump and stepped back. "This way. I'll take you to C – the Director."

Hal glanced back at the Widow. "Thanks for the ride and… the back-up."

Agent Romanoff gave another sharp smile, slow and sensuous as a naked blade. "Don't forget. Call the boys if you get in trouble again."

No need to ask what she meant.

"Will do."

She stepped out after Skye, and the ramp closed behind her. The engines roared to life as Hal followed her guide deeper into the hanger, past a large jet plane, and through a door on the opposite side of the hangar.

Skye hadn't lied. The rest of the base was nicer than the "garage." The soft pastel color scheme reminded Hal just a little too much of a hospital, but drywall and some (misguided) attempts at décor made her more comfortable. It was all very bland and healthful. No personality. No conflict. Ironic, considering the type of people who made up SHIELD.

Voices filtered through a few doors as they passed, but no one met them in the hall, and Hal got the idea SHIELD's new base of operations was run by a few good men. Few being the operative word. Just how much was the new Director working with? How many operatives were Hydra plants? Were SHIELD's other bases in the same shape as the Triskellion? Weapons? Tech? Resources? What was left?

Her files needed thorough updating.

Skye chose a seemingly random door and tossed it open, swinging it wide so Hal could see in. A bed. A desk. A closet. Same ghastly decorating scheme.

"I wanted to show you your room first," Skye said, twisting back and forth from her knees in an unconscious nervous habit. "So you could drop off your bags and all, but," her hands fluttered in a vague gesture toward Hal's feet, "clearly you don't have any. But it's always nice to know where your space is. At least, I always think it's nice. So… the Director's this way." She pivoted on the ball of her foot and marched down the hall. Her arms hung stiff at her sides, hands in fists.

Hal made the effort to catch up with her and smirked. This was the kind of awkward she could understand.

"Thanks."

Her gratitude melted the tension from Skye's shoulders, and the young agent immediately stepped along with renewed energy. "You're welcome." They shared a more companionable silence after that. Until Skye said, "Sorry. Kinda nervous. The Director has me on welcome wagon duty. Says I'm good with people." A shrug. "I guess I just want to do well. Not too good at… protocol. Or orders. Or… official…ness." She tried to pass it all off as a big joke. "New management and all."

"I have your file," Hal said. "You _are_ good with people. The Director obviously thinks so, too. So maybe you should just – I don't know – be yourself? Worked so far, right?"

Skye smiled again, and Hal could easily see what the Director saw in the unconventional recruit. She naturally put people at ease.

"Make sure to write a good customer review."

They stopped in front of a door – totally indistinguishable from the others – and Skye knocked.

A voice came through the door. "Come in."

Skye turned the knob but stepped aside, ushering Hal through. "I'll see you around." Once Hal passed over the threshold, Skye soundlessly closed the door behind her, leaving Hal alone with the new Director of SHIELD. Hal met a pair of merrily crinkled eyes across the room and felt a bubble of warmth rise in her chest.

Phil Coulson.

She'd always liked him. Polite. Honest. A genuinely good person. Never met him. But she had that sort of relationship with a lot of people. And if anyone could take her quirks in stride, it was this man.

"Director."

He glanced away, and Hal saw a blush threaten to flood his cheeks. But Coulson had excellent control, and the flush was gone before it had a chance to crest over his face.

"Miss Renold." He extended a hand for her to take, and after a quick grasp, they assumed chairs on opposing sides of his desk. "Just Coulson, please."

"Fine. I'm Hal."

"Hal."

She'd never met anyone with twinkling eyes. She'd always assumed it was a turn of phrase. But there Coulson sat. Twinkling away. How was it possible for a man brought back from the dead to be so damn… _polished_?

"I'm sure you're eager to debrief, but we both know it will be a lengthy process, and you just escaped a hostage situation."

Clearing her throat, Hal peeped down at her hands, folding them like origami in her lap. "More like 'released.'"

Unfazed, Coulson nodded. "We will need to discuss that, too. But I'd like to start with any immediate threats Fury might have taught you, or any allies who might, in light of recent events, need immediate extraction."

"Honestly, sir, I'm not even sure what happened yet." It stung, to be so far out of the loop when she was supposed to be the fount of all knowledge.

"I'll have my people fill you in, but for I'll trust our judgment." He smiled wryly. "Worst case scenario. What are we dealing with?"

For the next two hours, Hal sat in Coulson's office, speaking, sketching, explaining. He was a good listener – knew when to wait and when to ask for clarification. He repeated important names and recorded coordinates for future reference. As she explained each file, he worked on his computer, searching simultaneously for any recent activity. Hal had never worked _with_ someone in this way, and the easy tandem felt good. They breezed through what equated to stacks of files, and if Hal's stomach hadn't growled, they might have kept going all night.

But it did, and Coulson caught it.

"When was the last time you had a chance to eat?"

Hal thought of the apple, munched – about a day ago – in a warehouse, eyeing the Winter Soldier as he stared back with his usual impassivity.

"Uh… a while?"

"We can fix that."

He pushed back from the desk and strode toward the door. Hal all but tripped over herself to follow.

"I thought you wanted…"

Coulson stopped, turned to her, and leveled his best Director Look. He'd better practice that. He'd be using it a lot.

"You've given me enough to keep the few people I have available busy for _days_. The world won't end because you have dinner."

Dinner. Food. A real meal. Her first full meal in – what – three days? She could kill for a sandwich. Maybe literally. She imagined herself tackling the Winter Soldier for a Happy Meal.

Yeah. Pretty accurate.

She'd reached that point.

But…

As Coulson grabbed the knob, Hal set her hand flat against the door, holding it closed. She held Coulson's questioning gaze long enough to let him know she was in earnest, and then, more hesitantly than she'd have liked, made her demands.

"I'm happy to give you and SHIELD whatever you need. I won't endanger lives, and I'll fulfill the mission Fury left me, but if I'm going to be staying here for a while, I need a few favors."

To his credit, Coulson didn't even bat an eye. That might change once he heard what she wanted. "Of course. What do you need?"

Deep breath in. Deep breath out. "A room without security cameras. I've had more attention these past few days than I've had in… well, in years. And it's freaking me out. I need to be alone and know I don't have Big Brother peeking over my shoulder. I just need some solitude right now."

"Not a problem." Coulson cocked his head, smirking. "Billy might have a coronary, but I can handle that. Anything else?"

Now they'd reached the crux of the matter. "I want to keep a private record – call it a video diary – while I'm here. A regular session alone in my space. And I want to send that information to a private server I have access to outside of SHIELD."

"Without prescreening and approval, I assume."

"That's the idea."

Coulson held her gaze like he could ride down the path to her eyes and dive straight into her brain. It took a minute before he found whatever he was looking for. "No SHIELD intel. Nothing that could compromise my team. And if someone is forcing you to do this, all you have to do is ask for help, and we'll eliminate the threat."

Hal shook her head. "It's voluntary." She tried not to feel offended. It didn't quite work. "And of course I won't put anyone in danger. You said you trusted my judgment before. Trust that I won't screw things up now. I'm good at keeping secrets, remember?"

"I never forgot," he assured her. He waited, eyebrows raised, like he expected more demands. "If that's all… I really think we should get some food in you before you fall over."

"I think that's an excellent idea."

Coulson smiled.

"Great. I've got some people you should meet."

"Your team? I have their files already."

"Hal." He dropped a hand on her shoulder, warm, anchoring. "You're going to learn there's a big difference between knowing a file and knowing a person."

Two rights and a sharp left later, Coulson eased open yet another identical door.

To reveal a small crowd.

As far as crowds went, it really was quite small. Only four people. But the crowd was staring at her, and Hal felt like she was on stage. Her knees locked, and even with the gentle pressure of Coulson's hand at her back, it took her almost a full minute to stumble two steps forward.

Coulson looked around the room, beaming with all his usual benevolence.

"This is Hal Renold. She knows everything there is to know about SHIELD. Including your files. No need for introductions. If you don't believe me, just ask her." Patting Hal on the shoulder, he turned to leave. "I have some new data to sort through. Take care of our guest, would you?"

The door clicked shut behind him. Hal stood paralyzed, looking at all the people watching her. She inventoried them: Skye, Melinda May, Jemma Simmons, AntoineTriplett. Didn't Coulson have Ward and Fitz on his team? Where they on a mission? Watch? Potato-peeling duty?

Before she could ask, Simmons popped to her feet and rushed forward with a hand ready to shake. Hal barely lifted hers before Simmons grabbed it for a two-handed pump.

"Skye was telling us about you. It is true you have all SHIELD's files in your head? Would you consent to a few scans?"

Hal reeled back. Too far too fast. "Um, I, uh… Maybe later?"

"Oh! Of course! Sorry, no, not right this second." Simmons took a few steps away, rebounding from her initial assault. "You've been with Director Coulson for hours. I'm sure you must be hungry. I know you didn't have a chance to eat when you arrived. When was your last meal?"

This was going to be fun. "I remember an apple yesterday morning."

"Tripp," Skye said, also scrambling to her feet, "this is an emergency. Break out the pizza rolls. This woman is under fed."

"Yes, ma'am." The only man in the room offered Hal a nod and a wink before he marched off to fulfill his orders.

Simmons gestured to the empty seat next to hers, and Hal sank into it, happy to be even a little less conspicuous.

Hal found her eyes slipping to Agent May, partly because her stare was the most focused, partly because she was the most likely to give Hal a thorough explanation of everything following Hydra's unmasking. After all, May had the highest clearance ranking of Coulson's agents.

As if reading her mind, May gave the slightest shake of her head. "Recover first. Eat. Sleep. I'll bring you up to speed before you continue debriefing with Coulson tomorrow."

Hal accepted the instructions. Nodded. Skye and Jemma looked at her like she was an alien.

"You guys have some freaky telepathic link going on?" Skye asked. "Or are you just secret twins?"

"We're both well-trained," May said, sarcasm drawing her words into a drawl.

"Well, I hope that training made you hungry." Agent Triplett emerged from the side room – where Hal assumed the kitchen resided – balancing a tray. "Because this pizza needs work. Hope you like pepperoni."

"That was fast," Skye said, eyeing the pie with distrust. "Sure it isn't still frozen?"

Triplett rolled his eyes. "Right. Of course. Because I totally forgot the _one step_ in making frozen pizza."

"Better safe than sorry." Despite her mumblings, Skye reached for the first slice.

Jemma batted the hand away, though, pouting at her colleague. "Guests first."

Tentatively, Hal pinched the crust and dragged a slice into her palm. The dough felt suspiciously cold, and she decided she should've given Skye's dramatics more credence. A note for the future. She raised the triangle to her lips and took one very chilly bite. Not frozen. So at least she didn't break any teeth. That was the bright side.

Everyone was watching, so she forced a smile. "It's good."

Skye grabbed the next piece and stuffed it in her mouth. With an exaggerated flourish, she tore it back out again. "Nope. She's just too polite for her own good. This thing is what would happen if Elsa tried to bake a pizza." She grabbed Hal's slice and tossed it back down with the others. "I've got this." Hefting the tray, she rushed the entire pie back to the kitchen.

Awkward silence reigned.

Until, eventually, Jemma tried to apologize.

"It's not always like this," she said. "Tripp doesn't always cook."

"Ex_cuse_ me?"

.O.O.O.

He only stayed the first night because the apartment had three clear means of egress. The door. The fire escape by the sitting room window. And the roof, accessible by a ledge just above the window in the bedroom.

He stayed the second because no one came for him.

He stayed the third because he had food.

He stayed the fourth because the mission's first email arrived. He opened the message, but the body remained blank. The Soldier had been made to learn how to operate basic technology for the purpose of espionage and data retrieval, but it took him a few moments to realize the message came with an attachment. He released a breath he hadn't known he was holding as a fresh window sprang open and the mission's face appeared.

A video message.

"_Hey." The mission – _Hal _– smoothed her hair –_ clean, combed, she'd showered recently –_ over her shoulder. She tried to smile _– her anxiety made his normal_. _

"_Hope you get this. And you're well."_

_She stopped, chewed the inside of her cheek. _

Strange, having a conversation with a woman who wasn't in the room, to whom he could not even reply. This was, he reminded himself, only a recording. She wasn't even in this moment with him.

Her voice sounded a little rougher than he remembered. Did she always sound this way? Fear often altered vocal range.

"_Your friend's an asshole."_

The confession stirred a flutter in his stomach, and the sensation rose up his throat, threatening to spill out his mouth. The Soldier had vomited before. This felt much the same. But it was the most pleasant kind of sickness he'd ever experienced.

_Embarrassed by her vulgarity, the mission tried to smooth her hair a second time. "I'm working on him, but it will probably take a while. Just… be patient. It's a lot to ask, I know. But give me a week, and I think I can get what you need." She peered off screen. At what? A visitor? A clock? Notes? Her eyes returned to the lens – _it felt like she was looking at him._ "It's getting late. I'll send you daily reports. Sorry I couldn't message you sooner. Debriefing sucks." _

_She smiled. Hesitated. Lost the smile. Tried to revive it._

"_Goodnight. I guess. Take care of yourself." _

The screen went black, and the message with the attachment returned.

The Soldier wrestled with the idea of playing the recording again.

But he couldn't think of a way to validate such an effort, so he closed the laptop.

**A/N: Day late and a dollar short, but what can you do? This chapter wound up being 4000 words (twice my usual minimum). Not everything I wanted, but I kept writing stuff for later chapters. Especially the next one. So the next chapter's going to be quite long, too. Silver lining?**

**For those who've asked about my family: thank you for your support. Right now the lady in question is in hospice care, which means the doctors have decided she can't be fixed, and everyone's just trying to make her comfortable. We're all having private breakdowns in our separate corners right now. We'll make it. It just sucks.**

**Replies to Anons:**

**(Chapter 11)**

**GhostyGuest: Awww... *Mad Blushing*. Thank you, and you're welcome! I like flawed characters, too. Things are just too easy with perfect characters. And they're annoying as CRAP. Thanks again!**

**littlewolf: Thank you very much! I've had a lot of fun chewing on this plot, so I'm glad you're having fun, too. Bucky is so much fun, but so difficult. Glad I've been getting him right! Thanks again!**

**Guest: Thanks for the review! Hey, I sound awkward when I speak, but I never shut up. Never let that stop you. You have a VERY good grip on Bucky's character, and I'm very glad you like where I'm taking him. The road to recovery is long, and you know no one ever comes back from the journey the same way they left. Hope you continue to enjoy the story, regardless of whether or not you review!**

**Guest (Sah): Thankies much! I salute you for mastering your cell phone. I have a Not-So-Smart-Phone, and even though it has internet access, it's effectively useless. Hal's interactions with Steve aren't over yet, but that's all I can say about that... for now. Thank you, thank you, and thank you for all your tremendous reviews!**

**Keeley: Thank you oh so much! I'm all kinds of flattered. Pardon me while I go deflate my ego. Thanks again!**

**(Chapter 12)**

**Sah: You guessed! Congrats! Hope you liked the introductions (or lack thereof). I want Hal to be happy, too, however as a writer, it's my prerogative to throw as many obstacles in her path as possible. Alas, poor Hal. Thanks again! Good luck with your room!**

**Inkwriter: INKYYY! That's your official nickname. So let it be written. So let it be done. Anyway - FRIGGIN' TECH! Yes, the gremlins get me, too. My sincerest sympathies. Hope you liked the dose of Widow in this chapter! Thanks again!**


	14. 14

**Disclaimer: The past. The present. The future. In none of which I own rights to the Marvelous World of Marvel. Alas.**

**Warning: Some casual spoilers for Marvel's Agents of SHIELD.**

.14.

As the Soldier continued to learn about the Compendium, he learned more about himself. Or, rather, he found where the biggest and most troublesome holes existed in his abilities.

The Compendium enjoyed cooking. Her kitchen was well-stocked with a wide range of provisions, and her cabinets hold a choice range of dishes and tools he assumed were designed for food preparation. He only recognized a few items – pots, pans, plates, and silverware – but he assumed, because they shared space with the stranger implements, that they must all serve the same purpose.

As for the food… Like the tools to prepare them, many of the items were entirely alien. However, while his mind couldn't summon actual memories of making meals, his hands seemed to know what they were doing. Especially with the cans he discovered in the pantry. There was a tool to open them, but he couldn't find it in the kitchen, either because the Compendium didn't own one (unlikely, since she had so many cans) or because of a disconnect between the memory in his hands and the ones in his head.

Fortunately, his hand was stronger than the flimsy metal cylinders. The process was often messy.

A few other foodstuffs were familiar. Bread, for instance.

He rationed it all very carefully at the beginning. He had no way of knowing how long it would take the Compendium to procure his information, or how long this location would remain clear. And, as his mission had pointed out at the beginning of their… acquaintance?... stealing, no matter how petty, would draw attention. The wrong pair of eyes could ruin everything. Or a curious story about a silver-armed thief.

Best to stay where he was safe.

Where he was welcome.

He eyed his latest mess – contained to the sink this time (thankfully) – and wondered how welcome he'd be when the Compendium returned to her safe house. Sticky sweet syrup from a can of peaches gleamed in tacky pools around the basin's rim. A full handprint of the stuff wrapped around the faucet where he'd tried to angle the water for cleaning. All he'd done was add puddles of water to the syrup slicks.

But the _peaches_. The word came back as he ate them. He could read the label. Had understood the picture on the can. But the truth of _peaches_ came back as he plucked a slippery slice from the ripped can, dropped it in his mouth, tasted sugar and juice. So sweet and so good.

He reexamined the mess. It was, in retrospect, entirely worth the consequences.

The syrup had crept into the joints of his mechanical hand as he ate. But he found even that turned out to be unexpectedly pleasant.

He was still happily trying to suck the juice off the last digit when the laptop trilled, signaling the arrival of a new email. The Compendium rarely received messages, and most of those came from bookstore memberships and internet film databases. At this hour, he assumed the message came from the Compendium herself.

He was right.

A few taps to the mouse pad and Hal's face popped onscreen. She lifted a notepad and held it up to the camera. As he leaned in to the screen to read, the Soldier tensed. Was she in danger? Had she discovered bugs in her room? Was the base under attack?

'_Spent the past twenty-six hours straight in a debriefing session. Everything's fine. But I have no voice right now.'_

Relieved, he leaned back a fraction of an inch.

She lowered the notepad to flip the page, and the light from her computer screen accentuated the slight rings under her eyes. A new note appeared.

'_Can't call Captain A today, but saving up to yell at him tomorrow.'_

The Soldier nodded, all too aware that she couldn't see him. She had not given up on the mission she'd set for herself.

She _wanted_ to help him.

He still wasn't sure why that was so important, only that it was. A voluntary assistant was far more reliable than one who agreed to help at the end of a knife. She hadn't agreed at the end of a knife. The knife made her refuse. But when he'd asked, quietly, she'd said yes. He was lethal as any blade, of course, but instinct told him any unintentional physical intimidation hadn't swayed her to his side.

Maybe she had a plan of her own. No one with so much in their head could possibly act without thought. Still. Those thoughts developed her from mission to ally. They'd changed together. She gave him what he needed, but she'd held her own when she believed his methods put his independence in jeopardy. He couldn't say he trusted her. Trust was something he felt for handlers, for a chain of command he'd discovered looped around his neck in a choke collar.

However, he wasn't… concerned about the Compendium.

She followed her missions. He followed his. So long as they had the same mission, he could rely on her to do what was necessary.

On screen, she lifted another card.

'_Sorry, too tired for much else.' _

Of course. For optimal performance, she must rest. The Soldier knew he functioned on less sleep than others. Other members of assigned teams often fell asleep while in transit to or from missions, or curled up in corners, sleeping on rotation on longer assignments. His missions slept often as well. His handlers preferred most targets to be eliminated in daylight, so the world could shy away in the direction Hydra desired it to turn. But sometimes, particularly when assassinating deserters or failed operatives, he would creep through windows or backdoors, swooping into darkened bedrooms where missions curled, sprawled, or snuggled under blankets. Usually, they died before they even woke, and if not for the black spatters he knew to be blood, he might mistake them for sleeping still.

So it didn't surprise him that the Compendium, small and frail as he knew her to be – it had taken conscious effort not to snap her arm when he escorted her between bases – needed so much rest.

But her last card, flashed carelessly, almost as an afterthought, caught him off guard.

'_Sleep well.'_

Unnecessary. A futile sentiment, seeing as how the few hours he forced himself to rest screamed with all the things he dared not consciously examine.

But it pulled on reflex, an atrophied muscle-memory that begged to respond:

You, too.

.O.O.O.

Steve drew her face as reference, driven to record the one Bucky chose – the first stranger he defied programming to deliver. Memory had saved Steve, but he hadn't figured out what, exactly, had kept the Winter Soldier from killing or abandoning Fury's Compendium. The sketch, he hoped, would provide answers down the road. Some questions took a little distance to solve. And he knew this was one of them.

He was just shading the corner of her eye, where a scabbed-over nick told a story he wasn't ready to hear, when Sam dropped Steve's cell on the table. The pointed clatter said all that needed saying, and Steve looked up, ready to defend himself.

Sam wasn't a man to glower. Instead, he wore a patient expression of determination, all quiet wisdom veiling a very real threat that involved duct tape and the trunk of a car. It was his job to know what people needed, and he'd taken to making sure Steve got what was necessary, even if Steve had better ideas.

Steve didn't have the heart to point out the unlikelihood of his friend physically forcing him to do something he didn't want to. It just didn't seem polite.

"Something wrong?"

Sam's expression didn't falter.

"Five missed calls," Sam said. "This week. That's what's wrong."

Steve decided to keep working on the sketch. Doing something with his hands made him feel more competent. It provided immediate results. "Buck will come when he's ready."

"You're right. But holding back on him now won't help him be 'ready' any faster." Sam stepped in close, and Steve could feel him hovering just over his shoulder. "You need to give her a call."

"We've talked about this."

"You're waiting for your buddy to make a move. Well, he's made it. He asked an untrained woman who _miraculously_ survived two days alone with him to act as an intermediary. He wants to remember. He's trying. But you've gotta give him some more slack before the line snaps and you chase him off for good."

The pencil still rested in his fingers, but Steve couldn't convince it to move. He rolled it absently, thinking. "You know it's not that easy."

"I don't remember ever saying it was easy." Sam was trying to be nice about it, but Steve could practically taste the sarcastic derision. Yes, Sam understood why he wanted to help Bucky. But he stayed for Steve's sake. Not the mission. Wilson didn't have much faith in their ability to find the Winter Soldier, let alone restore him.

But Sam just wouldn't drop this. He was determined to have Steve and Hal talk, and he wasn't above shoving the two in a cell together if that was what it took. Sam had been wrong about the Winter Soldier before – Steve had reached his friend on the Helicarrier. But maybe, this time, Sam was right.

It wasn't like they had any other leads. Steve felt like he was friends with a ghost.

He was friends with a lot of ghosts, actually.

He gave up on the sketch, leaving Haley Renold's face in a rough half-step between dimensions – partially fleshed out in developed shading, partially empty lines.

"Next time she calls," he said, "I'll talk with her."

Sam, with a suspicious amount of nonchalance, lifted the phone and tapped a few buttons. As he strolled along the screen, he pointedly ignored Steve. After a minute, he tapped something Steve couldn't see, and dropped the device directly in Steve's lap.

He'd highlighted a number. Steve had seen it flash across the screen often enough to know whose it was. His glare didn't feel harsh enough as he scowled at his wingman.

Sam folded his arms across his chest, the picture of intransience, and shrugged.

"No time like the present, right, Cap?"

.O.O.O.

Coulson had done the impossible. He'd made Hal _cool_. Or at least her unusual talent. He'd already thrown the gauntlet as far as random trivia about SHIELD was concerned. If it was in a file his team could access, the motley crew would quiz her on it.

Well, not exactly quiz.

More like a never-ending game of Stump the Trump.

The only one who never played was Agent May. Agent May was too cool for Stump the Trump. Agent May was too mature. Agent May, frigid as she was, came as a nice break when she made her rare appearances.

Once the team realized her knowledge expanded far beyond the limits of SHIELD intelligence, the game began in earnest.

Jemma tended to ask about biology.

"Which reptiles have a third eye?"

"Tuatara."

Tripp liked to ask about American history.

"Why does the Pentagon have no marble?"

"Because during World War II, when it was built, Italy was an enemy and not too keen on horse trading."

Skye asked about coding, and she managed to stump Hal three times. Then Hal spent a night reading three handbooks on basic coding and computer systems.

"How do you remember this stuff? Seriously? Curious minds want to know."

Grabbing for the popcorn, Hal grinned across the table at Tripp, who clutched the bowl to his chest like an infant. She spared the conversation barely enough attention to answer. "I had a library card and the internet. Did a lot of reading. Watched a lot of films. Tends to expand one's database. No big secrets there."

The game had been a lot slower when she'd lost her voice. She still sounded a bit more like Agent Romanoff's alto rasp than she was comfortable with, but Skye assured her it was sexy. That was the only attractive thing about her at present. Since she'd left all her belongings in her apartment – aside from the never-forgotten go bag – she'd been wearing nothing but ill-fitting SHIELD sweats for the past two months. She kept herself clean, but that was the limit to her beauty regimen.

"Honestly," Tripp said, taking a handful of his own from the bowl, "I feel like you have an unfair advantage."

Hal smirked, offering an open shrug. "I'm… smart?"

"No."

"Oh, you mean because I'm a woman."

"Nah, nah. I'm talking about the fact that you know all of _our_ files, but no one knows anything about _you_." He peered around the table, gaining silent support. When his eyes finally returned to Hal, they'd sharpened into a playful challenge. "Forget stump the trump. I think it's time for twenty questions."

And just like that, the fun went dead. Hal sat stock still, caught between hyperventilating and not breathing at all. Twenty questions? _What did you do before you were the Compendium? Have any siblings? Still on speaking terms with your family? Do they know what you do for a living? Any plans for the future?_

Oblivious, Skye leapt into the fray. "Technically, I met you first. Just saying. So I should get the first question. And my question is: what's your favorite book?"

Never mind. All those awful questions Hal had considered before Skye opened her mouth seemed like great conversation starters now.

She tried to let the silence win out, but they all just watched her expectantly, waiting for her answer. Her tongue darted over her lips, and when she finally spit something out, it felt like she'd ripped something open inside.

"_The Wind in the Willows_."

Still oblivious, Skye bounced gleefully and adjusted her seat. "There, see! That was pretty painless, huh?"

It felt like she'd been socked in the stomach, actually. She waited, breathless, for the next question, her mental walls eroding under the force of resuscitated memories pulled from the dustiest corners of her library. And then…

Coulson stepped in. Quite literally.

He swung open the door, perfectly pleasant, but with a suppressed hum of energy Hal couldn't quite identify.

"Sorry to interrupt, but there's a call for you, Hal."

She squinted.

A…

Wait.

"On the line you've been using," Coulson elaborated.

His office line, then. Once Hal had explained she needed to make regular calls to Captain America, Coulson had been more than willing to surrender his office for a minute or two each evening. Maybe he hoped for a visit from his star-spangled idol.

And if a call came in for her…

She popped up from the couch like a jack-in-the-box. "I need to take this."

Coulson stepped aside to let her through, smile just a little more mysterious than usual.

Happy as she was to escape questioning, she was even happier to squelch down all the memories the game had stirred with a giddy rush of adrenaline. Progress. Real freakin' progress. She had to give Cap credit – he embodied the American ideal of pointless stubbornness to a 't,' but she'd gotten sick of the no-call-back gig _weeks_ ago.

He must've gotten tired of beating his head against the same wall.

She tried not to feel smug, but she couldn't help herself.

Her glee rang loud and clear when she picked up the phone in Coulson's office.

"Hello-ooo?"

"_Miss Renold? This is Steve Rogers." _He sounded like he was arranging a colonoscopy, not having a conversation.

Hal missed the old phones with their curly wires. She desperately wanted to wrap one around her finger just then. Damn, she was good. "Figured. Are you ready to share, Mr. Rogers?"

Still eating an unseemly large slice of humble pie, Rogers took a deep breath. On Hal's end, it sounded a bit like a wind tunnel.

"_I guess I don't have a lot of choice." _He was struggling to hold onto both his temper and his pride. Hal could hear it clear as day in the officious way he clipped his words.

It was downright yummy.

"Then let's meet someplace." She peered around the office, wishing Coulson kept a calendar or something. Or a map with a You Are Here sign. "Not entirely sure where I am. Actually. Agent Romanoff knows. So does Coulson. I can put him back on if you'd like to make the arrangements. I'm sure he's lurking just outside the door."

"_Thank you."_

She set the phone on the desk and threw open the door. Sure enough, Coulson stood waiting about three feet away. She stuck her hands in her pockets, feeling so very cool, and jerked her head toward the room.

"Cap's on the line for you."

.O.O.O.

She looked at the camera, wondering if her nervous shivers would translate to the recording. This had become so normal, so routine: "Hey, working hard, nothing yet, but still trying!"

And now…

She took a deep breath, her fluttering diaphragm adding a funning vibrato as she exhaled.

"Captain Rogers has agreed to speak with me."

Small bits at a time. Biggest bit first. She smiled.

"We're meeting tomorrow. He's not too big on SHIELD right now, so he doesn't want to know where the Playground is. One of the agents will take me to the area. I'll get the information, come straight back, and send it to you directly."

And then?

She hesitated, the smile slipping into a cattycornered smirk.

Would he still need these messages after he had Roger's stories?

Suddenly, she wasn't sure what to say. She wasn't sure what to _do_. Fury didn't want her, apparently. She'd served her purpose, and he had yet to contact her with new information to keep, or a new role to fill. Heck, he hadn't even asked if she'd work as a janitor again.

She had enough information to keep herself busy debriefing with Coulson for another few weeks – he'd requested sketches of the highest ranking threats, assets, and the endless odds and ends Fury had yet to categorize. But after that?

Debriefing was almost reflex. She'd absorbed so much, she was more than ready to spit it back up. Her mission with the Winter Soldier had required a lot more care and attention. This might be the end of that mission.

She sat at the top of a teeter-totter, waiting for the drop, not sure if there would be anyone on the other side to send her up again. She'd been here before. She hated it.

"So, I guess…" She cleared her throat, smoothed back her hair, made a show of rubbing her throat, leading him to think this was just her voice acting up again. Not entirely a lie. Sometimes she still went squeaky, or froggy, or gravelly. "I guess I'll talk to you tomorrow."

Usually, she ended her messages with some courteous little farewell. Take care. Sleep well. Rest easy. And she genuinely hoped he did. When they parted, he needed a shower, a bed, and many more cups of soup. She wondered if he used her apartment like she'd suggested. She wondered if he could figure out the shower. If he understood how a microwave worked. If he'd ghosted himself with a bag of flour.

If he slept in her bed before taking a shower.

And while all that seemed strange, and uncomfortable, and a little scary, they all seemed like good things. Learning, resting, healing things.

This might be the end of all that. She doubted he'd stay at her place – if he had at all – once he had the information he wanted.

She didn't have anything left to say. No careful well-wishing. No gentle suggestions.

Grimacing, she ended the recording. She sent it off before she could talk herself into redoing it. He didn't need anything more from her. She shouldn't give more than he needed. Besides, tomorrow promised to be a long day.

.O.O.O.

She had to borrow Skye's clothes. It was weird. She hadn't worn someone else's clothes since… a really long time. The SHIELD issue sweats didn't count. They were new when she got them. Ugly, but new. The jeans and top Skye handed over – which _almost_ fit the way they were supposed to – were shaped and stretched to the contours of someone else's body. Underneath the detergent, Skye's personal scent and girly perfume lingered. A tiny stain, faded by many washes, revealed an accident from several weeks back, when Jemma knocked over Skye's coffee.

She felt like she was wearing Skye's skin.

And she was already anxious.

She'd checked, double-checked, and triple-checked the portable recorder Coulson gave her for recording her 'video diary,' which she'd only used as a glorified webcam up to this point. Once she was satisfied everything was in order, she went through and checked it all again. What if something glitched?

"Yes, I'm sorry, Captain Rogers. I know you're busy saving the world every other weekend, but my tech crapped out on me, so would you mind coming back to share your difficult, gut-wrenching, unspeakably painful memories of your not-so-dead-but-totally-brainwashed-bestie with me again?"

She snorted. Not likely.

This had to go right the first time.

She would get it right.

A knock tapped at her door, and she sprang to her feet, smoothing the loose shirt and checking her belt. That would be Tripp. Coulson dubbed him the DBS – Designated Baby Sitter.

"Come in!"

She didn't turn around as the door opened, focusing instead on loading the camera, three sets of spare batteries, and a teeny-tiny tool kit into a plushy camera bag she _almost_ trusted to protect everything.

So she didn't realize it was Coulson until he cleared his throat.

She spun around, instantly assuming the worst.

"Did he call back?" she asked. "Did he call off? Are we still on?"

Coulson smiled in his gentle calm-down-honey way, and Hal began deflating before he even spoke. "Everything's still on. Don't worry. I just wanted to have a word with you before you left."

Hal smiled, setting the camera bag aside. "Want me to get an autograph for you?"

Coulson ducked his head. A lesser man might've blushed. But his eyes sparkled when he looked up again, and he waved at Hal's vacant desk chair. "May I?"

"Naturally."

He assumed the seat, and Hal bopped about for a minute, trying to figure out what the polite thing to do was, and wound up sitting on the bed next to the camera bag.

She always felt safe with Coulson. It was a gift of his. But this was her space, and she felt vulnerable here. Fury never came to her apartment. They met in his office, back alleys, and other places where any eyes were jaded and inattentive.

Coulson folded his hands, faced her directly, and Hal tried to mirror his attitude.

"You should know – I don't approve of the way Fury used you."

It took Hal a full five seconds to catch up. Her response was instinctive.

"I don't think…"

"Hal." Coulson wasn't a man to interrupt. He knew how to respect those with whom he conversed. Some of the serene gentility had melted from his face, and Hal could tell by the shade of anger in his voice how much this affected him. She wondered how much of this was actually about her, and how much was about the veil of secrecy Fury wove between Coulson and his memories. "Whatever your codename is, you're not a book. Fury found you when you were low, and he made sure you never regained what you'd lost. What connections you had, he broke, and he made damn sure you didn't make any new ones."

Low.

_A rainy D.C. day, nothing but cardboard overhead. Faded pictures only she remembered. Excuses no one wanted to hear. Black shoes by her knee. Trench coat fluttering, reaching into her shelter. Hot coffee. A dour smile._

"_Shitty day, huh?"_

Broke.

_Secrets. Work. Adding sub-basement after sub-basement to her library. Her own place. Neighbors with cookies and tea. A dour face. No smile._

"_Don't give them a reason to ask questions. We can't afford that. Besides, if the bad guys find out what you've got, who do you think they'll squeeze to make you talk?"_

_Distancing. Polite. _

"_Make yourself easy to forget."_

She shook her head.

"It wasn't like that."

"You had no team inside SHIELD. You had no family or friends outside. I understand why he did it, but I can't agree with it. With any of it. He threw you in harm's way without training."

Hal blinked, looked away. Her hands rested, still folded, in her lap. She realized she was chewing her lip and stopped.

Coulson watched her with the worst kind of pity.

"I just want you to know that we thank you for what you did, and we're going to help you reconstruct your life. You can become part of the new SHIELD if you want, or you can walk out the door and forget about us. There are plenty of options in between."

Yeah, right.

"Forgetting isn't really an option, you know."

He took the sarcasm in stride, and Hal felt a little disappointed that Fury could get a stronger reaction than she could, and the former Director probably wasn't even on the same continent.

"True. And now that your secret is out, SHIELD's enemies won't forget you, either. But a normal life – if that's what you really want – is still plausible. It would take time and resources, but SHIELD owes you that, and if that's the path you choose, I'll make sure you can walk it."

Well, she had no idea what to do with this. With any of this. With the Winter Soldier. With Captain America. With either Director. With her own self.

Shit.

She hadn't even left the base yet, and already she was exhausted.

She scrubbed her face and glared at her latest boss.

"And you decided to tell me this now?"

Coulson rose from his seat, beaming once more with casual friendliness, and let his hands fall to his sides.

"I thought it might be good to have some perspective. Whatever you're walking into."

She cocked her head. "Whatever?"

He shrugged. "Just a feeling."

Another knock came at the door, and Coulson opened it to reveal a baffled Agent Triplet.

"We can talk more when you get back," Coulson said. He nodded to his agent, who jerked an acceptable approximation back, still glancing between his boss and his assignment like he'd missed something. "Enjoy your day out."

.O.O.O.

The interview started about as well as expected.

Tripp stopped at a little park about a block away from the little diner where Hal was to meet the Captain, armed with an alarm beacon in case anything went wrong. She'd pressed on, armed with a matching beacon – cleverly designed as a gaudy silver bangle – and found the man himself waiting for her in the back corner booth with a baseball cap pulled low and shoulders tucked up to his ears.

Incognito was not his thing.

They'd exchanged pleasantries, ordered enough food to avoid looking suspicious, and then the ego kicked in.

"You know," Rogers said, picking at a basket of fries, "this would've all been a lot easier if you just helped me find him in the first place."

She closed her eyes. Took a deep breath. Counted to ten. Then to twenty. Thought of puppies and kittens and kiddie scrawls of rainbows and unicorns.

But she still wanted to stab him in the face with a fork.

The guy was too used to being _right_. He was the face of justice, honor, freedom, and the American way. Too be fair, the well-starched super hero wasn't often wrong. He seemed pretty damn oblivious to the delicate workings of his private life, though, especially where it bumped into others'.

"You know what? I'd love to. It would be my pleasure to tell you where he is, or give you a direct line of communication, or dangle this interview like a treat until I lured him into a face-to-face confrontation with you. But you know what else? That's not my decision. And it's not yours. He's lost just about everything else; I'm not taking this decision from him, too."

Rogers rearranged his fries, giving the exercise way more attention than it deserved.

"I'm sorry," he said at last. "This is just… more than a little complicated for me."

"You and me both." Hal didn't really eat her salad so much as she tossed it. The poor thing came to the table thinking it was a Caesar. Now it was just confused. "I do get it, though. You wake up – everything you know is gone. You finally get a piece of that world back, and he doesn't remember you. I get it."

Rogers abandoned Fort French Fry to rub his eyes. This must be taxing him as much as it drained her. "It's worse than that. Bucky was… When we were growing up, Bucky was my hero. I wanted to be him, the big guy who stuck his neck out for the little guy. And then our roles were reversed, and things weren't exactly what I thought they would be. He fell, and… And now I'm watching my best friend, the guy I practically idolized growing up, serving as a weapon. Killing civilians. Hunting my friends. Coming after me. I just… It's complicated. And it hurts more than I can say. But I won't give up on Bucky. I can never give up on him."

Hal slumped. The anger took her backbone with it as it slowly drained away. This would be so much easier if she could just stay mad at the guy. "Just so you understand. People don't come back from these kinds of things. They can only move forward."

"I know." He pulled away from his hands. "That's why I'm here." His palms pressed flat on the table. "So. How are we doing this?"

She set up the camera, checked, double checked, and triple checked everything again. And then she let the man talk. Story after story came rolling out, bringing an ever-changing ripple of emotion across his face. Sorrow and glee. Fondness. Embarrassment. Frustration. Jealousy. Pride. Much more.

Hal sat spellbound, absorbing a childhood decades in the past, held fresh in this one precious memory. The lunch crowd came and went. She barely noticed. The waitress gave them a few dirty looks, but there were plenty of empty tables, so Hal refused to feel guilty. She'd leave a good tip.

Eventually, Rogers stopped. He finished with an apology.

"I'm sorry. That's all that comes to mind right now." He hesitated, looked around the diner, and eventually brought his eyes back to Hal. "If I remember something else, I'll give you a call?"

She couldn't believe he was putting her in charge. He made it an option. It wasn't really an option, but she appreciated the sentiment.

"Sure thing. You've got my current number."

"You mean Coulson's number." He swallowed. "Still not sure… They told us he was dead."

"You've seen SHIELD's ugly guts now, Rogers. Are you really so surprised Fury lied?" That was so much gentler than the truth. The truth was always easier sans blue alien DNA with a history of driving subjects insane.

"I guess I shouldn't be." He gave her an evaluating glance. "So you've got all that garbage locked in your head? How do you sleep at night?"

Hal stared at him, unblinking. "I close my eyes and count terrorist cells. Makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside."

Rogers took his turn closing his eyes and counting to ten. Hal could practically see the numbers ticking along over his head. When he looked up again, he seemed a bit sheepish. "Sorry. Pretty stupid thing to ask."

Well, if he wanted to open _that_ door…

"It's okay. I realized the first time we met that you're pretty stupid for a smart guy."

He _laughed_. Hal sat, gobsmacked, until he stopped.

Still shuddering with the aftershocks, he said, "Well, that's one way to put it." He cast a throwaway smile to the beleaguered waitress and threw a pair of twenties down on the table. "Dinner's on me."

Hal was still trying to figure out what she'd said to flip Rogers' switch. "How charmingly old school of you."

"What can I say? I'm an old school kind of guy." He adjusted his ball cap and shoved his hands in his pockets. "I'll be in touch. If you hear… let me know if there's anything I can do."

Nice save, pretty boy.

"Of course."

He started to walk away, and Hal sprang up.

"Thank you!"

It had been a long hard struggle to drag the information out of him, but he'd surrendered in the end, and he'd come all this way… it was the least she could do.

He stopped, peered over his shoulder. "You're welcome." For a minute, he deliberated over whether or not to say anything else, and Hal waited, still as a statue, until he was ready. "Thank you, too. You're very… I think we need you right now. So thanks for putting up with us all. Take care of the jerk for me."

He looked forward and marched to the door, and this time he really did leave.

Hal, vacillating between the warm fuzzies and utter mortification at all the thanks being tossed her way, packed up her little bag of gear and breezed past the waitress.

Time to go back to her room and think about her life. Maybe she could take Jemma up on that brain scan…

She made it less than half a block before someone grabbed her arm, clapped a hand over her mouth, and yanked her into an alley.

**A/N: You may have noticed I did not update last week. I will not apologize, because I've had a massively shitty two weeks. The family member in hospice died. I've had multiple break downs. Broke my year long No-Cutting streak. Etc. Just not fun. But now we're moving on. **

**For those who are confused: Coulson and his team are pulled from Marvel's Agents of SHIELD, a wicked awesome show I highly encourage you to watch. **


	15. 15

**Disclaimer: I don't own _Captain America_. Don't even have a plushy Cap. Which is a shame.**

.15.

Blind panic.

For about point five seconds.

And then…

_This guy's hand is really cold_.

Which was immediately followed by…

_This guy's hand is really hard._

All leading up to…

_This guy's hand is metal._

And of course that meant…

_Hello, Bucky._

She immediately relaxed in the not-so-figurative iron grip, and her snatcher eased his hold accordingly. As his palm fell away from her mouth with the faintest of _whir_s, she rolled her lips, like she was applying lipstick, trying to restore the feeling. He didn't let go of her arm, though. It made things a little awkward when she turned around to face him. He watched her carefully, stone cold, but Hal could see the tension in his jaw, and it made her smile.

"Miss me?"

No answer. Well. Just like old times then.

She looked pointedly at the fist wrapped around her arm, then back to his face. He followed her eyes down and back. Maybe it was Hal's imagination, but she thought he hesitated for a moment. There were many ways she could take that, but she preferred to see it as a good sign. It might mean he was thinking. He had to stop to consider his actions, what he did or did not want to do.

Or maybe her nonverbal communication just wasn't as good as his. Her frigid death glare could definitely use more work.

But in another moment, he let her go. Instinctively, she rubbed her freed arm, and she almost missed the way his eyes followed the motion, or the fraction of an inch that disappeared between his eyebrows. She blinked, and it was like he'd never moved at all. Man was faster than a weeping angel.

"You have the recording."

Whoa. Way faster than a weeping angel. Possibly also telepathic. And he'd stayed at her place. Or stopped by to grab her computer. Either way, he'd listened. She was ecstatic. For about two seconds.

"I just told you that last night," she said. "How did you know where I was? Even I don't know where I am." She couldn't help the hint of suspicion in her tone. She regretted it, but she couldn't hide it.

But the Soldier didn't take offense. His sass wasn't that developed yet. "I received your message. I tailed the Captain."

"You tailed…?" A new thought dawned on her, and she bit her lip to keep from laughing. "You've been following Rogers?"

Even though his words weren't there yet, his expression very clearly expressed, _No shit, Sherlock_.

She flushed and toed a crack in the cement. Yes. Of course he had an eye on Rogers. He was the Soldier's best hope, and he was the Soldier's greatest opponent, depending on the mood. Spies tended to keep tabs on people like that. She wondered if Rogers knew, if the two men spent their days creeping along in each others' shadows, waiting for the other to change the dance.

"He is not trying to hide."

Hal scrutinized his expression for a sign of the desire behind those words. Teaching? Apologizing? Just practicing his verbal skills?

It was strange. She saw him so differently than she had the last time they'd been together, standing over two dead bodies, wondering if she would become a third. She'd been exhausted, hungry, several leagues beyond flustered. She hadn't, at the time, thought of him as a person. He was a Big Bad File she had the responsibility of contributing to. She had, to some extent, mirrored him. So long as he regarded her as a mission, she could echo his distance. Only when she touched his arm, when she _surprised_ him, did he become a real person. And the contact had startled them both so badly – and Rogers had announced his arrival so dramatically – neither had a chance to understand. Understanding took time, and careful thoughts presented in neatly stitched words, tumbling along out of order.

"The recording."

His hand sat between them, palm up, like a table. Hal grabbed the camera bag and went fishing for the memory card with a few wordless mutters. Thing was bad as a purse. Impossible to get what she wanted when she actually needed it.

She finally dug it free, held it up for them both to marvel at, and dropped the chip in the Soldier's palm with a flourish. She was trying very hard not to feel offended.

"I would've sent it tonight."

He brought the card to his chest, cradling his metal hand around the one of flesh, as if an agent might pop around the corner with a rocket launcher and try to blast the thing just because he was holding it.

Softly, he said, "Too important."

And – poof! – instant feelings of shitty-ness. True, she had no idea what her next move should be. But she was smart enough. And she had resources. People she trusted. She'd been worried about her own problems after this mission. It had been a while since she considered what it meant to the Soldier. She'd preached to Rogers. Justified her actions. Reasoned it all out. But she hadn't stopped to feel the meaning of her words.

This was his _life_. Soul. History. Memory. All those important things with gooey, irreplaceable dimensions.

Hal stuffed the tips of her fingers into her pockets, cursing whoever decided women only needed three inches for their wallets. Maybe if she could keep her hands under control, she could get a grip on her mouth. Of course, the Soldier already tried that technique…

"That should play on my computer." She was still a little fuzzy on how much the Soldier understood about modern technology. Modern weapons certainly hadn't been a problem, but his data retrieval skills might not be so advanced. Better safe than sorry.

He nodded, slowly un-fisting his hands so he could look down at his prize before he pocketed it.

She thought that would be it. He had what he'd come for, and by all logic, he should be leaving. Instead, he stood there, looking at her with a face too soft for a scowl, but not shaped for any true emotion. He seemed as confused as she was.

Here they were. With the answers he'd stolen her for. She had no plans, but he must. Super spies always had plans.

Was he afraid to go back, open her computer, and accept what Rogers had given him?

Hal couldn't imagine someone else explaining who she was. Silently drinking in someone's else's memories and then trying to construct out those stories a person in which to live. Boggling. Terrifying.

If he wanted to dawdle, she'd play along. Tripp wouldn't miss her for a few more minutes.

Ideas of identity gave her a good place to start.

"I still don't know what to call you."

His hands clenched into fists at his side. Relaxed. Hung empty but stiff. Hal wondered if his fingers would be more comfortable around a knife.

"I am…" The slightest twitch, like a shake of the head. "Names are irrelevant."

"Names are not irrelevant. Names are the people we want to be. Or the people we're told to be. Names are choices."

He didn't close his eyes, but Hal knew he wasn't seeing her. He'd fallen back into his own head, locked out all the distractions. Since she'd done the same thing to him several times, she didn't think it was fair to interrupt. Gradually, he came back to himself.

He shook his head again, more definitely this time. "I have too many… parts." A rueful expression, almost a smile, overcame his face. "No name for all the parts together."

Hal prepared to say something flippant. He wasn't finished, though.

"But you…" He squinted. "You want to be Hal."

She wished he hadn't put it like that. She covered up with a smile. "Yeah. I'm Hal."

His face opened, and he looked genuinely pleased. Because he'd been right. "Thank you, Hal."

"For the computer?" She tossed off his gratitude with a shrug. He might be happy with everything he'd gathered, but she was still caught on the teeter-totter. And accepting thanks always made her feel just a little too vulnerable. "No problem. Not like I'm using it. You can keep it if you'd like." Before she'd caught up to herself, she'd blown on ahead. "And stay in the apartment as long as you need. I won't be back for a long time. If I ever go back. I doubt SHIELD will base itself in D.C. again."

He cocked his head. Analyzing her. "You will stay with SHIELD?"

If she had the answer to that question, she'd be a happy woman. "Debriefing will take another month or two."

"They want everything." He said it like he understood what that meant.

Hal found that funny. "No one wants everything. You only ever want the good parts. Why do you think so many marriages end in divorce?"

A mistake. Her snark redirected him, and he turned back to the real question.

"And after they get the good parts?"

She'd liked him better when he was tall, dark, and silent. He was getting too perceptive. Still, it was all about the answers to his questions.

"I joined SHIELD because I wanted to stop running. But that's all I do. Maybe some people are just fated to keep living out the same story, over and over again, until they go into the ground."

It probably wasn't what he wanted, but she really didn't care. So long as it gave him something to chew on until she was on her way back to base with Tripp, she'd take it. And now for her timely exit.

"My ride is waiting," she said, stepping to the side, toward the open sidewalk. "I really need to get moving before he gets worried."

The Soldier parted his lips, like the pressure of a word was building up behind them, but he pinched his mouth shut again and nodded once. But he didn't leave. Didn't spring onto a rooftop or vanish in a puff of smoke. Just stood there. Watching her. Like she was calling the shots.

She picked her way back to the street with more little steps, keeping her eyes and an anemic smile pinned to the Soldier. Just before she left their shelter, she turned. Stopped. She felt so much braver when she couldn't see him.

Reconstruct her life, Coulson had said.

Reconstruct what? All the parts she gave a shit about were gone.

Coulson also said she had options.

As a matter of fact, she did.

"I don't know where you're going after this," she said. "But when my business with SHIELD is done, I… If you need me for anything, I think I'd still like to help you."

There was no way she could turn around, but she could feel his stare pricking up the little hairs on the back of her neck, and nervous energy crackled through her nerves like lightning. He wasn't going to answer. She needed to get out of there. Now.

"Good luck." A flutter of humor. "Whatever your name is."

Then she lost her nerve and surged out of the alley.

The Soldier didn't follow her.

Tripp was waiting exactly where she'd left him.

She didn't send a message that night.

.O.O.O.

She sent one the following evening.

And for every evening after that for the next month.

That brought her to game night in the Playground, where she sat with Coulson's team, cards in hand, gathered around a pile of spoons. Of course, by 'team' she meant Skye, Jemma, and Tripp. May played one round, watching stoically as everyone else snatched up spoons, and asked, "Does this mean I can go back to work now?"

So she was first out. Just as she wanted. When they peeked at her cards before shuffling them back into the deck, they found four jacks. She had them beat all along. She just didn't care to play.

Things livened up after she left.

Hal sat between Skye and Jemma, opposite Tripp, and she glared at the stubborn six hiding in her collection of fours with vicious hate. And apparently she wasn't the only one having problems.

Skye smacked Tripp with her elbow.

"Stop giving me crap cards, jerk!"

"Ow, hey!" The agent rubbed his arm, looking at Skye like she might jump out of her chair and sink her teeth into his neck. "I do what the hand demands. You wanna blame somebody, the dealer is to my right."

Jemma squawked. "I can't help how the deck is sorted! It's a random process…"

"You shuffled." Tripp said it with a twinkle, and Jemma looked away, huffing and puffing in a proper British wreck.

For such a small group, they had a very complicated dynamic. And for all her time with them, Hal still found her place on the sidelines. She was a welcome houseguest. The door would always be open. A room ready. Frozen pizza in the oven. But she wasn't ready to be a part of the team. Maybe, someday, she'd fit one of the ragged holes in the group's structure, or she'd find a way to add a new role. But not yet.

She tucked the rebellious six behind a four and tried to pretend it didn't exist. Even if the Soldier didn't take her up on her offer – and she expected he wouldn't – she'd find something else. Coulson was right. About a lot of things, of course, but specifically about her isolation. She'd been one thing for so long, she had to rediscover the art of diversification.

College sounded nice. She'd always wanted a master's degree. Or maybe she could travel. Then again, why not do both? At the same time? Lots of awesome universities overseas…

And she wanted to learn how to use a gun. With all the people out for her blood, she needed to defend herself. She couldn't count on someone always being ready to pull her out of the deep end by her hair. Or her ankle.

Still mired in her thoughts, her eyes roamed the table.

It took a solid minute of empty staring before she realized there were only two spoons.

Skye and Tripp noticed the same time she did, and all three sprang into action. Skye grabbed the spoon nearest her and fell back triumphant. But Tripp and Hal seized upon the same utensil simultaneously, and a bout of tug-o-war broke out. With one good yank, Tripp dragged Hal halfway across the table, earning a startled yelp from Jemma and a howl from Skye, but Hal didn't let go until her adversary physically pulled away from the table and twisted the prize from her grip.

She fell limp across the table.

"I am… defeated."

Laughing, Tripp turned to Jemma. "I can't believe you snuck one off under my nose."

Jemma lifted her chin. "Never underestimate an intellectual."

Rubbing her wrists, Hal slithered off the table. "I guess this means spoons just became a spectator sport."

"For you," Skye said. She tapped her cards on the table, grinning. "But as far as I'm concerned, this is still a contact sport."

Tripp plucked up his cards to toss them back in the scattered mess Hal's torso had made of the deck. "Sounds like a challenge to me."

"Careful, Skye." Hal flexed her fingers, trying to shake out a phantom pain. "He has a mean grip."

"Oh," Skye had that uneven smile she always wore when she went for a challenge. "I've got this."

As Tripp shuffled and dealt, Hal leaned back from the table and crossed her arms, trying to work the eternal kink out of her wrists.

She could be happy here.

Maybe one day she would be.

.O.O.O.

He had to watch the recording in segments. After the first five minutes, he fell to his knees beside the wastepaper basket and heaved. He retched until his vision blurred, and his stomach didn't calm until there was nothing left to vomit. Drool hung from his chin in pearly ropes, and he stumbled to the bathroom to clean the taste from his mouth. And face. He didn't clean the trash can, because he knew he'd be using it again.

Upon returning to the living room, he discovered that the recording had continued in his absence, and he had to restart the interview from the beginning. Five minutes in, he ran to the bathroom. His stomach had nothing left to give, but his psyche demanded he purge himself of… something… anything, and he shuddered helplessly as dry heaves buffeted him.

After that he decided to break the data in smaller doses. He could not take an hour of this at a time. Not if he ever wanted to eat again.

He couldn't sleep that night. One nightmare chased him awake, and he stared blankly at the ceiling for hours, reliving it. Clinging to the side of a moving train by his nails. Fear on his friend's face. The moment he knew he could not close the gap. Falling, screaming, watching that face above. Falling through wind and snow and never, never, never stopping. Never _dying_. Cold and fear and a raw throat. Though he never hits the ground, somehow he knows. Somehow he sees. Snow white. Blood red. Just like a fairytale. And pain so great it blunts his words.

The next night, he managed a full seven minutes before he fell upon the trash can and coughed up his dinner. He was happy, afterwards, to find a message from Hal. She made her preferred designation clear. The least he could do was use it. It cost him nothing.

And so he set the pattern for the coming days. Watching the interview. Gradually regaining control of his stomach. Listening as Hal continued to weave a glimpse of the present.

Slowly but surely, he felt the empty halls of his memory repopulated. Too much too fast, but he weathered through it, and before long he could do more than just grit his teeth and moan when a fresh image, word, or sensation rose from the ashes.

Soon he could examine them. Gingerly. Slowly. And he began to understand Bucky Barnes. Though the Soldier did not lose himself to the ghost, he found the ghost had corporeal shape, and it already existed within.

Barnes had always been a soldier. Always and never. He'd always been a _fighter_, maybe that was a better way to put it. He solved problems very physically. A smile and a dance could win him nearly any girl in Brooklyn. A lot in Europe, too. Bully? Nothing a solid hook and a swift kick in the seat wouldn't fix.

Then again, maybe fighter was too gentle a term.

Bucky Barnes had been a killer. Not always. But long before Hydra built the Winter Soldier. He killed in war. He was good at it. The difference between Bucky and the Soldier wasn't the killing. The difference was the choice. Bucky had 'ground rules.' The Soldier had orders. Of course, Bucky had always flirted with the shades of grey Captain America could not. Growing up, he was the hero. He was Steve's hero. But he rarely started the fights. If he intervened, it was usually personal. Not that he wouldn't make a show saving a damsel in distress or sticking up for the little guy, but he lacked Steve's bull-headed sense of morality. And he fought dirty when he needed to.

Hydra had used that.

_Your work has shaped the century._

They painted shades of deepest grey, blinding him with tinted goggles and dark rooms. Once he was broken, they knew how to keep him in line. He'd spent so much time in the shadows, he was already comfortable there.

And in the dark, the Soldier came to overshadow the man.

The truth was, at some point, he'd chosen to actively repress Barnes. Remembering was a battle he waged as much with himself as he did with the 'treatments' Hydra had subjected him to. He'd fought so long, even when he couldn't remember why the things his handlers demanded were wrong. And then, one day, one of the doctors had designed a new method of training.

Even with his resurging memory, the details came back blurred. He knew they had pumped him full of drugs. Kept him weak. Then they put a gun in his hands. A man in front of him. Two Hydra agents wrestled his finger over the trigger and squeezed.

They shocked him. Starved him. Forced his body to prioritize survival. And then, mind slipping, he listened to their congratulations for his first official kill. Even as he remembered, the memory came back cracked and distorted. It sliced in the kaleidoscopic chaos of broken glass.

Barnes had failed. He'd cried. He couldn't stop for hours. When they punished him, he just screamed his grief instead of whimpering.

There were others. Pretty women. Little children. Old men. Young kids. They found Bucky's ground rules and made sure he had nothing left to stand on.

At some point, the man's agony became greater than the weapon's, and the Soldier buried the blank scraps of his soul too deep for any torture or promise to ever summon back.

Until he saw Steve on the bridge.

And now he had to turn outside himself to discover what had always been within.

.O.O.O.

Coulson never had children of his own. He hadn't chosen the life of play practice, bike rides, and graduation ceremonies. He liked to imagine he had something like that with his team (target practice, plane rides, promotions and initiations), but sitting in that waiting room, flipping through a creased celebrity rag mag, he'd never felt so… pedestrian. In the best sense.

One of his wee ones was in the back.

If only she was having her tonsils out.

Instead, the doctors were fixing the carpal tunnel his organization had all but drilled into her arms. She was an artist in her spare time, true, and she'd chosen a manually intensive field of study in college, but Phil knew the real damage came from endless hours at a keyboard, typing page after page after page of agency secrets and strategies. She'd sketched faces and blueprints. She'd done in a few months what normal agents spread out over years. These endless weeks of debriefing finally brought her condition to a head.

Simmons had caught the damage when she finally trapped Hal in the lab for some tests. The early signs had been there all along. The biochemist was simply the first to notice them. Hal dropped a tablet she was working on, and Simmons discovered Hal had practically no grip. Simmons performed an official examination and then recommended Hal to a specialist.

So Coulson arranged a field trip, just himself and Fury's Compendium, to one of the SHIELD medical facilities left standing after Hyrda's assault. Less than a year ago, the technology there would've been a full decade ahead of the private sector. While still cutting edge, the hospital had been forced to downgrade after the vast majority of their financial support vanished. But it would work. It wasn't like the surgery was especially dangerous. So long as the doctors were competent, Hal would be fine.

He told himself he was only anxious because he was in the waiting room. Something about a place so obviously designed to calm and distract always had the opposite effect.

But Coulson couldn't lie to himself. A lot of unpleasant realities would be easier if he could.

He'd studied Hal's medical history carefully before arranging for her new doctors to receive her files. Everything appeared as he'd expected. Nothing to worry about. Only the usual civilian procedures. The only time Hal's childhood doctors had been concerned about her head was when they misdiagnosed her with Attention Deficit Disorder and tried in vain to find the source of the migraines she'd suffered periodically since early childhood. One scan appeared from a doctor a little too hung up on the idea of brain tumors. That was all. And the man hadn't even realized what he'd found.

A small relief.

Coulson set aside the magazine he'd been toying with and uncrossed his legs. He suffered from the overwhelming urge to _do_ something. Or say something.

He was getting tired of keeping personal secrets from the people to whom they belonged. Especially when he worked with those people on a daily basis. First Skye. Now Hal. Damn Fury. The former Director had played her so very carefully, giving her more information than she strictly needed, but keeping back a key insight as to her perceived value.

They'd discussed mutants on her second day in the Playground. Though hardly public knowledge, the whispers had been pulling together to build a disquieting specter for the past few decades. A number of scientists had discovered advanced mutations in patients across the globe. By and large, the differences were small, but all available data indicated a growing mutant population with increasing powers. Some of the details were new, but Coulson's security level had opened a lot of files long before he became Director.

It had taken Hal two hours after they'd changed the topic to the thready information available on A.I.M. before she'd blurted out that _she was_ a mutant. Her unnatural memory was perfectly natural. Evolution's latest experiment.

He already knew, and he told her as much. Fury had told Coulson when he handed over the toolbox and 'recommended' a certain book. Coulson didn't tell her what else the former Director told him.

His fingers wandered to the corner of the page, flipping distractedly past yet another exposé on Tony Stark and blindly perusing a recipe for kale chips.

Secrets, he'd always known, had their purpose. But lately he'd discovered they also had expiration dates. Sooner or later, the truth would come out, whatever he chose to do.

The page turned to bury the kale. Someone famous had dared to go shopping in sweat pants. Coulson couldn't even pretend to care.

He didn't know how much longer he could keep Hal's secrets from her.

He set aside the magazine with more care than it honestly deserved and was just folding his hands together when the doctor who'd introduced himself as Hal's surgeon several hours ago burst through the waiting room door. The doctor glanced around the room with the expression of a man who'd lost his wallet, knew he would never see it again, but couldn't bring himself to give up the search. It was not a good look for the man who'd been cutting into a member of Coulson's team less than an hour ago.

Coulson found himself rising before the doctor had a chance to rush through his excuses.

"I don't know how it could happen. I've been here for years. Never had a problem like this. Never could have predicted. I could blame my nurses, but security should…"

Low risk. She was a low risk surgery. Whatever the problem was, Coulson told himself, Hal had not bled out on the operating table. This man had not sliced open an artery. She had not bled out. Hal had not died. But the mantra wasn't enough. He needed to hear it.

"Is everything alright?"

The doctor froze up. His words became even more stilted. "No. Yes. Surgery went as planned. No complications. Fine. But recovery. We weren't out of the room for… anyway. Recovery. Waited to remove the ventilator, and she was gone."

"Is Hal alright?"

He just needed to hear the words.

"We don't know."

Coulson felt his temper heating, and he could hear the fire in his words. "You don't know? You're her doctor. Is Hal alright?"

"Like I said," the doctor straightened his white coat, "we don't know. She's gone."

"What do you mean?"

"She went to recovery after the surgery. Everything went smoothly. Then my nurses went to take out her breathing tube once the general anesthesia wore off. She was gone."

This time he snapped. "What happened to Hal?"

"I don't know! She disappeared. No trace. Anywhere. We've checked the whole hospital…"

Cursing, Coulson grabbed for his phone. If Hal wasn't in her room, it could only mean someone took her. With a breathing tube and the inevitably lethargy after general anesthesia, she wouldn't have been able to walk on her own, let alone play hide and seek with the hospital staff. How much time had the doctor wasted? By now she'd be out of the building. Coulson had no doubt. He waited impatiently for May to answer her phone as he calculated how wide a net they needed to throw.

Tripp had taken up position in the front lobby and Skye had her eyes on the video feeds. How could the perpetrator have gotten past them?

Hal could not be gone.

Minor surgery.

Low risk.

He'd held her hand as the drugs carried her off to sleep. He'd promised everything would be fine.

May answered her phone, and Coulson didn't even give her time to acknowledge before he spoke.

"We have a situation at the hospital. The Compendium has been stolen."

.O.O.O.

The Soldier was compromised.

The realization came as a surprise, one dull night, watching Hal gradually wilt through her daily report. She was tired that evening. The Soldier wanted to know why. And it dawned on him that he might have a situation.

He _wanted_.

Up to that point the only _want_ he'd suffered was the overwhelming mission to free himself from Hydra. Find himself. Regain autonomy. That drive had spurred him to break programming, save his mission – Captain America – from a watery grave. Run. Fight for a cause he was only just coming to understand: himself.

But now he wanted to know about this little dame. He craved pointless information.

He wanted to know if something had gone wrong. If she had an argument. Survived another attack. Or maybe she'd sacrificed sleep for something pleasant. He wondered if she'd stayed up reading a book. She must enjoy them. He couldn't think of any other reason to fill her home with so many. Did SHIELD provide their assets with books?

Asset.

He'd been Hydra's.

Was she SHIELD's?

The idea summoned something thick and black in his stomach that bubbled up his throat like acid.

An asset.

As he came to understand his situation, he began to see the Compendium in a different light as well. She said she _was_ the Compedium. He could be reading too much into it, but it smacked of programming. Hydra always told him what he was. He'd be surprised if SHIELD hadn't done the same to her. One way or another. There was more than one way to kill a man, just as there was more than one way to control one. He assumed the same was true of dames.

He didn't know what that meant to him.

He knew he'd just stepped in a mess, and he wasn't ready to sink any deeper.

So that night he took his gear, supplemented by things he'd 'picked up' over the past months, and threw it in a bag. After a moment's hesitation, he took the laptop, too. It seemed like a cheap trick to pull on his absent hostess, but she'd told him he could keep it.

He wasn't sure if he should keep watching the messages she sent, but they helped ease the tumult after he listened to his mission/friend expound on Bucky's history. Hal was the present. Her face grounded him there. She still served the purpose he'd initially pursued her for.

The messages stopped coming two weeks later. In her last video, she smiled, laughed, said she'd been playing mafia with some of the other agents. She never gave names, never even described the people who filled her days, but she must be with a very unusual team. A good team. From what he could remember, Hydra's agents rarely behaved so childishly. But Captain Rogers had endless stories about the shenanigans the Howling Commandos got into.

When the messages stopped, he assumed she had chosen to stay with those good people. Give up the ghost at the other end of the wire.

He was happy for her. A strange sensation. But one of the most pleasant he'd experienced lately. Something in the world was good and right, even if it wasn't with him.

And then, three days after the last message – or what he'd thought was the last message – the email chimed.

He opened the attachment, optimistically curious, and froze when the face on-screen was not Hal's. He found himself looking at a man, middle aged, clean cut. The man's mild eyes seemed pinched.

"_This isn't the introduction I hoped for, but – please – allow me to introduce myself before you cut and run."_

So this guy could run a trace? Not likely. He grabbed the screen, pulling down as he simultaneously reached for the power button. If he threw it against the wall hard enough and kept to the backstreets he should be able to put a few blocks between any tracking devices and…

" _This is about Hal."_

Again, he froze.

Pinched. The man's eyes were strained. Was that because…?

"_Fifty-eight hours ago, Hal disappeared from a SHIELD medical facility while under sedation for a minor operation. There has been no ransom, and none of our enemies have taken credit. However, seeing as how Hydra ordered you to retrieve her before the fall of the Triskelion, we have to assume the worst. Our enemies know who she is and what she knows."_

The Soldier sat back. Burning cold ice in chest, creeping into his blood. (_Cold and dark. His face. He could see… Reaching. Blanking. A gun kicking back into his shoulder after a long shot across three rooftops. Perfect. Bruising. Satisfaction. Bile. _No. Not the time. His demons were always with him. They could wait to play.)

"_My name is Director Phil Coulson. Hal was in my charge. I hold myself responsible for her abduction." Coulson sighed. Pinched the bridge of his nose. _(Pinched – pained). _"Our resources aren't what they were a few months ago. And we've already exhausted all we can trying to find a trail. But whoever did this knew what they were doing. They left nothing at the scene. Nothing on camera. No paper trail. Quite frankly, we need your help."_

A frown yanked down the Soldier's lips. Yes. They most certainly _did_ need his help. But he had questions this man must answer first.

As if foreseeing this obstacle, the man continued his dialogue to the camera.

"_Like I said, sorry we had to meet like this. But we've been keeping tabs on Miss Renold_'_s activities. Everything that takes place on SHIELD's servers is recorded and screened. And, honestly, we thought she would keep in contact with you, anyway." He smiled, but the expression added to the pain building behind those careful eyes. "Even if you're not ready to talk to Captain Rogers, and if you never choose to work with SHIELD, I'm asking you: please, please help bring Hal home. You saved her from Hydra once. Don't leave her to die now._

"_I'll send you information as we find it. You can use this account to contact us at any time. Until then, good luck, Sergeant Barnes."_

The email chimed again. This time there was no attachment, only a list of information. Where Hal was taken. When exactly the hospital staff last saw her. He noted this Coulson hadn't given him names. Probably afraid the Soldier would exercise some more… creative means of interrogation.

Maybe he had good reason to be afraid.

All he could think of, though, was that word: _pinched_. He understood the word referred to a face drawn in distress. But that wasn't the only meaning.

Pinched.

Stolen.

**A/N: What's better than a long chapter? ANOTHER long chapter! Drama at home continues. That is all. Thank you all for your support, though! You are darlings. So, I meant to have this up three days ago, but there was a party at work involving roller coasters and free ice cream, so, yeah, I ditched ya'll. And I'm not sorry. **

**Holy crap, Coulson POV is hard to write. And, yes, he is a lying liar. A very sweet lying liar, but he's SHIELD. Of course he won't tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. What makes him redeemable is that he doesn't enjoy lying. **

**A bit of business. Someone brought up some stuff in a review that I thought deserved group attention, just in case anyone else has been confused. I have nothing against Steve Rogers. Hal is angsty, defensive, and sees Steve as an obstacle. If you look back, you'll even see that, back when he was just a file to her, she was cheering on his social life. And she got past a lot of her frustration in the last chapter. That said, I am not Hal. Just because she's fed up with him doesn't necessarily mean I am. While I sometimes loan OC's a quirk or two, I actively avoid giving them my POV on other characters. **

**And Steve is not being a "self-righteous prick and unnecessarily uncooperative." He is also angsty, defensive, and terribly worried about Bucky. Terribly worried people sometimes make poor choices. And his choices aren't necessarily bad. Hal and Sam just disagree with him. It's perfectly logical to hold onto your ace when you're trying to lure someone in. The difference is that Sam is trained to deal with people who have PTSD. Steve is a really swell guy, but he's from an era where they didn't even know what PTSD was. Patrick Stewart has some really horrible stories about his dad, a veteran, and how official medical personnel blamed Stewart's mom for egging on his father whenever his father beat her. His mom did nothing. His father had severe PTSD. Even though Steve's been in our time a few years, the dude has an entire worldview to adapt. And that's taking time. Which is totally fine. He's doing leagues better than most people would be doing. Which leads me to another point: Steve also has PTSD. In _Avengers_ we see flashbacks, and there have been little hints at here, there, and everywhere in canon Marvel movies. Bucky is important. I don't blame Steve at all for trying to hold back in order to draw Bucky in. It isn't that he doesn't want to tell Bucky. Quite the opposite HE wants to tell Bucky. Maybe he's a little jealous that Bucky seems to trust this strange chick more than Steve. But if he is, he isn't consciously aware of it, because he tries so hard to be a good guy, and he'd address an issue if he was aware of it. Lastly, while Hal's a bit abusive in her POV sections, I don't think Steve has been a jerk at all when we're in his head. Steve is a Good Guy. Not a Perfect Guy. He has flaws. But he's not a jerk. **

**I don't usually explain my writing choices like this (I operate by the old Chinese concept that it's an insult to explain things, particularly ideas, to people), but this was a big thing, and I wanted to address it for anyone who's too shy to ask about it in the reviews. **

**Cool beans.**

**And, to be clear, the review I'm talking about wasn't a flame. It was just a review. Don't bother the reviewer, folks. And no bad-mouthing. They just brought something to my attention I thought deserved a broader audience. **

**Replies to Anons:**

**Kate: Thank you! I hope you enjoyed this chapter as much as the last!**

**Adriana: Thank you for all three reviews! Your well wishes are very appreciated. And - yay! Another AOS fan! I couldn't help tying them in. Practically unavoidable if you want to stay relatively close to canon and involve SHIELD. So happy you like how I write them! A lot of these characters are hard to balance, so it means a lot to me. Thanks again, and sorry I had such a short reply to three such lovely reviews! (It's, like, two, and my eyes are crossing).**


	16. 16

**Disclaimer: I have a lovely sandwich. But no rights to Marvel. Shocking.**

**Dedication: This whole story is essentially a gift fic for Shrubby, but I want to rededicate publicly, because we didn't have a chance to make that giant bird-flipping paper-mache hand we talked about. No bird. Just Bucky. Hope he'll do. **

She needed help.

She could always scream, and someone would come. They would say they came to help. But they lied. They all lied.

She needed someone who wasn't… there. She needed another place, maybe. But she thought, maybe, some people helped. And if the people were right, the place didn't matter. But the people here were wrong, all the time. And she knew it.

They didn't help.

All they left was the sense of repetition. Her instincts couldn't be erased.

Now there was something.

Erased?

Did that mean she'd had something? Before? When? When was before? Before what?

What?

A thought materialized so quickly it startled her. Suddenly, she knew something – _remembered_. And that idea burst out in a thousand directions, awakening a thousand memories so loud and bright they blinded her, so she was falling in and reaching and finding but still falling and finding and reaching and falling and –

"Six days. Mark it in the log."

And she remembered that voice. And the hands on her arms.

She reached out. Felt inside their heads.

And she bit those hands, because they sure as hell weren't there to help.

One of the men kicked her in the face, and different kinds of lights exploded behind her eyes. Her ears rang and her body went limp as she struggled to reclaim herself. By the time she managed that, though, they had her tied down, and she could hear the crackle and whine as spidery metal arms crept into her peripheral vision.

Breathless agony. It overrode the need to think, to fight. The pain wound tighter and tighter in her skull until the whine lowered to a dull growl and…

She looked up. Around. Her breath rattled in her chest. Her throat hurt. But no one seemed unhappy. Pleased. Everyone seemed very pleased. Had something good happened? She smiled tentatively.

"Commence test seventy one."

.O.O.O.

The Soldier found the next Hydra nest in an office building at the heart of Detroit's business district. A nice place with a decent security system, but he'd entered without tripping a single alarm, and he soundlessly dispatched all but one of the agents holed up within.

The last he kept alive for questioning, the highest ranking officer in the team. The man with answers. And the Soldier wasn't interested in playing.

He incapacitated his target with a shot to the knee, sent the agent's sidearm skidding across the room with a flick of his boot, and pulled out his knife. Before he said a word, he stabbed the fleshy calf of the leg he hadn't shot. No running. And the target knew the Soldier meant business.

Once the agent stopped howling, the Soldier asked his question.

"Where is the Compendium?"

"I don't know what you're talking about! Please!"

The Soldier evaluated his target. Sweating, gasping, eyes frantically darting around the room.

He believed the agent.

Too bad.

He opened the man's throat with a flick of the wrist and sat back on his heels, frowning, as the man gurgled and pawed at his own throat, bleeding out.

The Soldier had learned two things. He hated Detroit. And Hal was not here.

At the Soldier's feet, the Hydra agent choked his last breath, and the agent's frantic eyes went glassy and still.

The Soldier was glad he hadn't brought the Captain. The Captain would've wanted to take the agent back as a prisoner, and the Captain did not like the way the Soldier asked his question.

He would meet Steve back in New York. Report the nest cleared. Report his continued failure to recover the Compendium.

And then he would want to talk.

He closed his eyes, allowing some of the ice inside to drain away with his flagging adrenaline.

Six months.

And somehow he felt like he was, once again, in a different century.

The first time he met with Steve, he was sure he would kill him. So he kept his distance. The Soldier stood on a street corner, directly under a light. He knew Rogers would see him there, so close to the exit of Roger's favorite convenience store. The Soldier waited until Rogers went in, and then he took up his post. And waited.

When Rogers saw him, he nearly dropped his sack of groceries. He rushed three strides forward as soon as he spied him. But Rogers was a commander, and he could read body language. So when the Soldier tensed and leaned just a little farther away, Rogers got the idea, and although it clearly took effort, the Captain didn't sprint across the scant hundred yards between them. Instead, the Captain froze in his tracks and strained forward as far as he could without taking a step. The Soldier imagined that, if the man had been a dog, he would've whined.

The Captain waited for the Soldier to make his move, but in the moment, the Soldier's memories, fears, and training swamped him, and he could only nod. In greeting?

The Captain nodded back.

The Soldier left. Quickly.

The second time, he still held trepidatious fantasies of his silver fist gripping Roger's throat and squeezing until the old mission was a mission no more. The image had the ring of memory, and he suspected it wouldn't be the first time he'd throttled the other man. But he came with a purpose, and this time, he had the fortitude to toss Rogers a memory chip. It contained all the information he could find at the Hydra base he'd sacked immediately after receiving Director Coulson's message. The base was only ten miles from the SHIELD hospital where Hal disappeared. Too great a coincidence to ignore. But he'd found nothing relevant to the mission. Granted, he hadn't entirely mastered modern technology. So he took what he could find and put it in more capable hands.

Six months, dozens of interrogations, and seven razed Hydra bases later, the Soldier still had no idea how enemy agents had secreted Hal out of SHIELD custody or where they'd taken her. He had plenty of theories, but no trail, no confirmation to carry him on to the next step.

Hydra was strongest in Europe, and the Soldier considered pursuing them across the Atlantic on a daily basis. But there were still enough nests on the North American continent to keep him busy. And a certain Captain would doubtless protest. Besides, he had no proof Hal had left the country.

Some days he wondered if it had been a kidnapping at all. Maybe the dame got wise, realized she'd never escape her role as the Compendium so long as she stayed with SHIELD. A burden like that – he wouldn't blame her if he cut and run. Hadn't he done the same thing, more or less? But he knew that wasn't the case. He couldn't explain in a way Captain Rogers or any of the others would understand, but he felt it the way he felt hairs rise on the back of his neck when he was being watched.

It came from the dreams.

They started three months after Hal vanished from her hospital bed. The Soldier didn't fight them. He studied them, hoping to understand the random breaks from his usual nightmares and memories. Nightmares left him wrung out of energy, tears, and bile. The dreams left him full of winking imagery, twinkling on a level his subconscious mind effortlessly accepted, but his conscious mind couldn't manage to hold. Many places he saw, he'd never visited. Or places he remembered came warped with familiar trappings he'd never seen, touched by times he'd never really lived. Faces he knew but didn't.

The tenth time he met with Steve (they had their first conversation the third time the Soldier dared approach – "How are you, Buck?" – "You're still alive." –"… Yeah. You, too.") he told him about the dreams. While Steve assured him they were perfectly normal, especially considering the circumstances, the Soldier knew the diagnosis was unreliable, because he hadn't told the Captain all the symptoms.

Though the dreams took him to different places, different crowds, different moods, one face never failed to appear and he recognized it, even waking. He always found Hal somewhere. Across the room. Sitting next to him at the bar. A picture on the mantel. He didn't know what that meant. He thought of her often, yes, but since her recovery was his current mission, that did not surprise him. But in the dreams she was not a mission. She wasn't necessarily anything to him. She simply existed in the dreams, filling them in the manner of a debutante owning the room.

He did not understand, and that burned him. The question itched under his skin, impossible to scratch, but his nails constantly wandered to the spot, digging and digging, hoping for relief. A familiar sensation. He'd experienced something like it during the torturous months after Hydra replaced his arm. His left arm always itched, but the metal limb didn't have the kind of sensitivity to itch, and it certainly didn't have the kind of receptors to appreciate a good scratch. Eventually, the quandary was bleached from his mind with endless rounds of electric shock therapy, the early stages of the chair.

When he was a weapon. When he was a tool.

When he was the asset.

Now he chose his own missions. And he'd chosen Hal. She was the first distraction he used to wean himself off Hydra's programming. It seemed fitting for her to provide his first opportunity to work with Hydra's enemies. He couldn't think of them as his allies, not yet, and while he wasn't foolish enough to believe the enemy of his enemy was his friend, He thought they might be worth a try. They had many connections and resources he'd lost since leaving Hydra. Even if he recovered Hal, the kind of support SHIELD offered might come in handy. So he watched them, sometimes from afar, sometimes up close, always with Rogers at his side. None of them dared cross Captain America. No one would touch him so long as he stood by their hero.

He doubted they'd like him so much if he ever came to them alone.

The Soldier knelt and wiped the knife on the dead agent's suit. He used the man's tie to get in the crease between handle and blade.

An old lesson, learned long before the birth of the Soldier.

If a man took care of his weapons, they would take care of him.

.O.O.O.

They sat her down, time and again, again, again. A nursery rhyme gone sour. She could taste it without remembering how, and it clung inside her mouth, growing down her throat to corrupt her guts, so she had to spit it out, everything they put in, and that kept them happy.

A suit on either side. Sometimes metal around her head. Sometimes a text-with-face across an icy field, three by five, and when she asked for gloves a suit grabs her head and smacks it down on the field. So she didn't ask, because it still pulled, just a little, under her eye. Or she thought it was hers. Didn't remember where the lines were. The texts-with-faces had such nice clear lines where one began and ended before another's start, and they never ever overlaped, even though sometimes they repeated, but even the repetitions were different, like how the information inside the texts-with-faces felt when she regurgitated it.

But she was in and over and through, and somehow that felt wrong, but she had to be for the suits. If she tried to draw her lines, they hurt the center of her dreaming – with fists and kicks and things at hand – to remind her that lines were bad.

She pulled as much as she could gather into the text-with-face across the field and brought up what she found.

"The hell is this? Some little corpse like this is – shit. Oh shit. Get out, freak. Don't look for – ninety degrees. That's not, no it isn't. Ninety degrees. Ninety degrees. Clear on the globe, with that little circle. Just like temperature. Shit it's cold. Is that?"

_Bang._

And the head she'd been inside fell apart as an unstoppable force propelled a tiny piece of metal right between the eyes and through the thoughts, out the back. Splat. Just hollow meat.

Lights reflected in the ice, twinkling, but with dark freckles she didn't like.

She wasn't aware she was rocking until the suits smacked her face into the ice. And ice was important somehow, but she didn't know why, and this wasn't really ice. She'd been here before, but not her. Someone else. Someone from the ashes, she knew. But she reached and stretched, never found. But _ice_. He hated ice. Because he was. No, he was winter.

And suddenly her lines tightened, and that wasn't ice, it was a table, and there was blood spattered there. And a dripping corpse across from her, and she couldn't stop screaming. Because she felt her own presence. She remembered. And she knew what would happen next.

The suits took her arms and pulled her from the chair. She kicked the table over, and it toppled the corpse, too, so everything was lying in blood. Her face was wet, and she didn't know if that was blood, too, and the suits had her arms so she couldn't check, but they were in the hall, and going down, and she knew what was about to happen, and she couldn't stop it, but she had to, had to, had to.

A different chair. Whining. Sparking. Straps and clamps and buckles. Pain. Shock. And…

Stand up. Sit down. Again, again, again.

**A/N: I won't call this a filler chapter, because it isn't, but it is rather short. As you can see, we have moved into a new phase of the story. I haven't really seen a lot of other fics twisting this direction, so I hope I surprised _someone_. And there are more surprises in store. Some massive hints for upcoming bombshells crept into this chapter. I'm interested in hear all of your theories. **

**I'm going to nip something in the bud, because I can see the questions coming, and I think I'll save us all some time. I'm basing a lot of Soldier/Bucky on what I know of the comics. I can't claim complete knowledge, but I did a frick-ton of research before I sat down to write this puppy. Now, while I LOVE the Bucky rehabilitation stories where he accepts Steve and/or Sam as mother hens and gradually recuperates in a supportive setting, this is not what the comics did with his character. I'm actually being nicer than the comics. He teleports away after Steve drops the whole "Remember" thing on him and getting flattened by flashbacks. He next shows up when Cap needs a hand on a tricky mission, and he gradually works his way into other stories, though (SPOILER AHEAD) he doesn't officially join the team until Steve dies. **

**To sum up: he appears when Cap needs him or when he needs something. At least for a while. He only really talks to SHIELD when he needs to replace his tech. So there's that. Of course, I'm taking liberties, because this is movie-verse, which is different, and because this is fan fic, which is even more different. **

**And now my author's note is nearly as long as the chapter. Eegads, I need to get less windy. **

**Replies to anons:**

**Oh, look, no anons. You all at Gen Con or something?**


	17. 17

**Disclaimer: I'm poor, tra la la, and I don't own Marvel. **

.17.

He had three names.

Some people would always fear him as the Winter Soldier. That was fine. The Winter Soldier was perfectly capable of fighting – killing – without a handler's leash at his throat. Better, even. And though he'd hoped briefly, breathing Steve's optimism, to step out in a bright new world, he'd found the same monsters. A few new ones, too. He decided the world still needed the Winter Soldier, and so long as those monsters still prowled, it always would. Since many monsters had been around in the years before the cold sleep, he assumed they would never really die. The Winter Soldier could hold them back, though. Beat them down. Keep them in the dark where they belonged.

Steve would always know him as Bucky. No matter how twisted or fouled his mind, the smirking lieutenant from Brooklyn would never truly fade. And even when he couldn't see it, Steve could. Honestly, he could usually see it, too. Not all of the memories were there, but when he smiled, he smirked. He recognized the confidence in his walk as a saunter. And although he had yet to actually chat up one of the girls he caught glancing his way from time to time, he could feel the way he would. Like an old footpath, the packed dirt never quite forgot the rhythm of his step.

And the last name – James. A mother's voice he couldn't quite remember. The official documents tracing his route through the world – birth certificate, army files, death certificate. All those facts just seemed so appealing. That name had less mystery to it. He was also the only one with a real claim to it. Hyrda had the Winter Soldier. Steve had Bucky. Apart from a family long buried, no had James but the man and the papers.

He thought, perhaps, he would give the third name to Hal. She had asked for something to call him by, and according to his efforts at categorization, she belonged to the realm of facts. She knew the Soldier. But she wanted to help James. He was certain.

He hoped, someday, to tell her.

But he doubted he ever would.

Director Coulson had not called off the search, though. Quite the opposite. Which, the Soldier told himself, was the only reason he still met with Steve, still accepted SHIELD intelligence, and always looked for prisoners first when routing Hydra bases.

It was not, he told himself, because he enjoyed Steve's company.

And it was certainly not because of the dreams.

The computer chimed, and he pulled himself away from his musings to click open Director Coulson's latest report. He listened with the patience drilled into him from decades of debriefings and orders, but a jaded sarcasm tinted his thoughts as he absorbed the information. Once the man on screen finished speaking, Bucky lowered the screen, leaned back, and rubbed his eyes.

What a surprise.

They still had nothing.

.O.O.O.

She surfaced, but this time she kept quiet. She didn't move. She stared at the wall as she had a moment ago, caught in a daydream of disconnected concepts that still refused to coalesce in thought.

Such clarity was a rare gift. The suits would take it away if she let on.

At first, she hadn't understood she was pretending. The word had stuck in a corner of her mind like chewing gum, meaning peeling away in long, sticky strands, leaving the real meat behind. It had been the repetition. They hadn't meant to, but they'd taught her to lie. Or, at least, to lie by omission. If she acknowledged them, they took her to the chair.

As her definition of self gradually regained a concrete outline, she felt like time folded over on itself, and she looked through the stack to discover endless reenactments of the same scene. When they knew, they put her in the chair, and they started over. If she said anything but what was passing through the books-with-faces (_people_) around her, they took her to the chair. If she reacted, they took her to the chair.

Sometimes they didn't need a reason. She hoped today wasn't one of those days.

She still wasn't sure why the chair was bad. The chair stood out, but she couldn't understand it. It was simultaneously the clearest and blurriest part of her mind. She thought it might be where she began.

Figuring out where she ended, however, proved difficult.

It was easy to pretend when the suits came, when they wanted to hear the insides of someone else's mind. Because whenever someone else was present, her delicate perimeter of consciousness faded. She flew apart, reaching into and through the borders of other minds, borders made thin, she thought, by her presence.

She was only lucid when she was alone.

And so she played her game of omission: speaking endlessly in the presence of others, turning them inside out; keeping silent by herself, bottling the strange new dreams and feelings that came from no one but herself.

She held on to information she gleaned outside herself, and when her perimeter grew back, she examined the facts she'd found. Some of them she couldn't understand.

The suits were hammer. Whatever that meant.

She was a book. Somehow special. But ultimately blank.

Apparently the Yankees were terrible.

Of course, all these facts were tainted. The suits lied. She'd known that… before she knew anything. And the lies had deep roots, tangling seamlessly through thoughts, memories, and even basic concepts. When she sat alone, looking at the wall, she couldn't always tell which fragments were true.

Her mind could hear farther than her ears, so when two suits came down the long hall to her place, she fell inside their minds long before her ears could register their footsteps. _Another day of…a shame, really. Grateful that – Oh! Did you catch the game last night? 3781. If they'd ever just upgrade the damn tech… print scans better… value._

The door opened behind her, hinges whining, and she surrendered to visceral pain of the two new souls tearing her apart, absorbing her. Her mouth fell open, and she gave the thoughts free passage.

"Mornin'. Don't think she's moved since last night. Last – oh, shit, my wife. Have to buy her flowers tonight. Might forget tomorrow, and I forget again this year, she'll – I will _never_ get used to that. Something's are just wrong, you know? Whatever they did, I'd don't think she's even there anymore. Always been off. What was in that burrito? Sure. Nothing but an echo chamber now."

.O.O.O.

James strolled down the boardwalk, taking the loops and curves without a blink. A seagull passed him, upside-down. Flying fish arched in waves over his path to build a moving, shimmering gateway. On the horizon, the Statue of Liberty melted against the sun, her welcoming beacon sagging, her crown drooping, drops of her raiment pooling on the island at her feet.

Hands in his pockets, James lifted his face to the wind and took a deep breath. The sea air smelled like fresh bread and sidewalk chalk.

It wasn't the strangest thing he'd ever dreamed.

The girl was here, somewhere, and all this was just set dressing.

He'd spent the day tossing a Hydra bunker with Steve. No sign of Hal. Not in the computers. Not in the agent's memories (not that he could put too much pressure on them with Steve standing there, watching, trying to hide his fear that his Bucky would regress into the Winter Soldier). But James always found her in his dreams. And tonight he needed that. Even the illusion of success was welcome. So he wandered along, taking in the half-melted scenery as the sun disappeared, the heat eased, and stars began wheeling overhead.

And then he found the carousel. The old one from Coney Island. But it was inside a building now, and he could only see the vague shapes of horses rolling in and endless march through tinted glass doors.

He knew he'd find her inside.

He slipped through the door and scanned the darkened room. A dream where the world was deserted. Only the two of them. He'd been having a lot of those lately. He thought it might be a matter of focus. He couldn't tell whether or not that was good.

Ahead of him, the horses heaved up and down on the revolving platform, riderless, save one. A ghost in a red dress, made up like the girls he used to take dancing, clung to one make-believe pony. James smiled as he approached. The ride continued to revolve, never ceasing, and he watched the outer poles spin by, timing them careful before he grabbed one and swung aboard. The world slipped past, the horses charged in place, and he felt a rush of pleasant memories growing at the back of his mind.

Hadn't he brought Steve once? Put him on the girliest horse, laughed at his buddy's angry frown until his sides hurt and the operator kicked them off.

Other trips. Other rides. A bunch of different dames swept away by the dreamy spin, enchanted by the music and the fantasy of it all… He'd have been a rich man if he had a dollar for ever kiss he'd stolen across the aisles.

He wound a path to the vision of Hal, halting just a couple horses back, content to watch.

He felt like he could think here. So he took a place at the edge of the platform, holding onto one of the supports, and let himself by hypnotized by the eternal motion.

"Do I… do I know you?"

She'd never spoken to him before. He looked down the warped aisle of undulating horses to where she sat on a white steed with a silver mane.

She looked at him with those wide, fearful eyes, and it hit him with the force of Steve's shield that this wasn't just his dream. The way she looked at him – he could feel it. She was a sentience presence, no shadow stuck on a loop from the shallow end of his subconscious.

"How?" His voice came hoarse, and his hand clenched on the pole until his knuckles turned white. This was not a good place for a conversation. He didn't like people in his head.

But she didn't understand the question. "I don't know, I…" Her eyes roved the carousel, perhaps drawn by all the movement surrounding her, and her gaze couldn't settle on any one place.

Like, he thought, she didn't really remember who she was having a conversation with. Or how to have a conversation at all.

Oh, hell.

_No_.

He licked his lips, struggling to maintain control, but he remembered that look. He'd felt that confusion, seen that face, when he found his reflection in the cryochamber's window. Just sentient enough to fear. Too lost to do more than grope at an impossible hope.

Everything he'd imagined Hydra doing to the girl, this had never entered his calculations. It didn't make _sense_. Why destroy the information they stole?

And this dream – all these dreams – did she make them? He thought of that boundless mind, all the knowledge, shattered and _reaching_. He didn't understand how. But he'd heard enough cries for help in his days as soldier and assassin to recognize an attempt to make contact. She needed him. She had been calling to him. All this time.

He left the edge of the carousel, warily making his way past rising hooves and flashing teeth.

"You okay?"

She understood that even less than the first query. Her eyes landed on his just when she spoke. "Bright."

"Where are you?" He doubted he'd get the answer, she was too far gone, but maybe she still understood orders. If she took commands, she would most likely respond to that tone.

She blinked. "What's the use of wond'rin' if he's good or if he's bad?"

He couldn't get anything out of that. Nonsense. Random association. How much time did they have left? How much had he wasted already? Maybe he'd missed something. Maybe she'd hidden a message somewhere.

It wasn't fair at all. Here he'd been looking for her all these months. He finally found her lurking in his own dreams, and she couldn't tell him how to find her. Sometimes his handlers would leave things he needed _just_ out of reach. He'd strain, trapped on the operating table, trying to clasp a glass of water. Or he'd nearly dislocate his arm pressing himself through the bars for a blanket. That had been a long time ago. Early in the Soldier's existence.

Hydra was using the same technique now, and they weren't even aware of it.

The carousel ground to a halt, the music dying in a low moan, and Hal vanished between one blink and the next.

James spent what felt like days alone with the horses. Sitting at the edge of the platform, fighting the urge to smash it all to rubble.

By the time he woke up, the dream held nothing but splinters.

.O.O.O.

The suits no longer considered her a threat. Or a risk. She could lie now. She could lie very, very well. But she still sat helpless under the onslaught of alien thoughts. Other minds always over-powered hers. Every time. Even the one suit who came to collect her for her… readings?( Not the right word. Best she had, though) was enough to overwhelm her. And half the illusion was empty repetition of what she saw and heard inside someone else's head. So she didn't fight very hard.

The suit's thoughts came echoing down the hall ahead of him, and she let the ideas spill out her mouth. The man came in just as she was repeating, "I really think she'll leave me this time."

His first kick caught her unaware. It took him by surprise, too. The action was gut instinct. Attacking a threat. Because what she said… she found it in his head, but he wouldn't accept its origins. He balked after the first kick and staggered back a step. For a moment, they both thought that was the end of it. But then…

"Oh hell."

And he kicked her again, and again, and again, and again. Something snapped, and she knew the pain was hers. His pain was different. He was trying to dispel it, but the more he struck her, the deeper the fear etched itself in his heart. Each blow confirmed it. Each sobbing curse proved it a reality.

Hal lied so well.

She didn't reveal her borders. Didn't defend her physical outline, the only place she could _be_. Even as blood coated her mouth, puffing in sprays as the suit's boot struck her diaphragm, she kept quiet. Kept staring blankly ahead. Until her vision went well and truly blank.

She woke alone. Something tight around her middle. Stiff and sticky places on her face. The other suits must have come. They had not taken her to the chair.

She was a very, very good liar.

.O.O.O.

The dream left the Soldier sleepless and agitated.

Here was his key.

Here were his demons.

He yearned to burn away his thoughts, and he took to strolling the city's streets at night.

He found himself in Brooklyn, as he often did, looking for a history buried in paint and politics. The winter air welcomed him, held his breath in petrified clouds, carried the noise of his step like crisp gunfire. Swathed in a wool coat, gloves, and a thick scarf, he drew little attention. He'd learned to blend in much better than he had after first escaping Hydra's hold. If he presented what others expected to see, they wouldn't pay attention to the details. He could be a ghost by pretending to breathe.

Still, gloves alone never felt like enough to hide the monstrosity that was his left arm, and he sank his hands deep in his pockets as he turned his eyes up to the apartment complexes he passed. Yellow lights in the windows blotted with silhouettes and sleepy television strobes. Cars' headlights spilled over the Dalmatian patchwork of snow and blacktop. In between, a grey world kept from the dark by light pollution and gusts of flurries.

Couples passed, exchanging references he couldn't follow. Teenagers sailed along in troops, using language the Soldier barely understood as English.

Time was an ugly trickster.

He couldn't bring back the past. A very old lesson, learned long ago, walking away from Steve, toward battlefields and blood. Clapping as he watched a crowd of fresh sycophants ready to turn his buddy into their hero. Even a tragic hero. So long as he got the job done. They applauded the shield and the muscles and the pretty boy smile, and Bucky knew his hate came from fear. Didn't quench the bitterness, though. So he always tried to smile for Steve, whenever the masses gave their poster boy a chance to look. And, more recently, there was the history he had no desire to restore.

He couldn't comfort himself with the past. But, then again, maybe he could. He left the city, calling himself every kind of idiot, tripling his usual practices to avoid detection or tails. Even with all his doubts, he soon found himself heading south. And he kept going as the night deepened, eased, and softened with the hope of morning. Orange and pink in the sky caught in still ponds as he passed, perfect reflections of dawn.

A bad idea. A good idea.

The best idea. The worst idea.

He ditched the car two miles from the house and walked down the road, ordering himself back with every step forward.

They'd been building up to this. It would have happened, sooner or later. Why delay the inevitable?

Down the drive. Up the steps. Standing at the door.

He waited for his hand to just lift itself and knock of its own accord, since his feet had developed minds of their own, but it didn't. And he stood there. Waiting. Five minutes. Ten. Thirty.

The door flew open and a man the Soldier remembered as Steve's ally (whom he'd last seen careening off the helicarrier one wing short of a set) stood there, toast hanging from his mouth, one hand on the knob, the other still trying to slip into a jacket. The Soldier never approached Steve when the man was with him. He didn't know him. Didn't trust him. Didn't know him. Had every reason to expect a negative reaction to his presence.

The man's eyes boggled, and the Soldier wanted to smile, but he found himself frozen. What would he do, this friend of Steve's? Fight? Run? Eat his toast? If the man dropped it, that would probably be a bad sign, a symptom of shock. A disappointment, certainly. Another thing the Soldier could ruin.

The Soldier's world hinged on one slice of toast.

For another five minutes, the two men stood in the doorway staring at each other. Waiting for the other to make the first move.

And, finally, Steve's friend took a deep breath through his nostrils, flaring them, and straightened from his precarious pose halfway through the door. He shook his arm through the stubborn sleeve and delicately plucked the toast from between his teeth. All very calm.

Steve's friend cleared his throat and said, "I guess you're here for Steve, huh?"

The Soldier nodded.

Steve's friend nodded.

Words seemed to risky to use unless strictly necessary.

After an uncomfortably long moment of silence, the friend said, "I'm heading to work. It'll just be the two of you. But…" He paused, his lips twitching in a miniscule frown that evaporated as soon as it appeared. "Steve knows my number if you guys need anything."

The friend waited a beat, eyes fixed on the Soldier. When the Soldier didn't move, the friend nodded, reverting to the simplest means of communication.

The Soldier nodded back.

And realized he stood in the man's way.

One step cleared the path, and with a muttered "Thanks," the friend jammed his toast back in his mouth and clattered down the porch steps to the drive.

Bucky waited, silent, until the car door opened, closed, the engine started, and the crackle of tires over gravel faded entirely. Then he reexamined the door. The friend had left it open for him. As an oversight or a sign of welcome?

Gingerly, he slipped inside. Two cautious strides brought him to the center of the tiny foyer, and though curiosity filled him with a raw ache, he kept his eyes on the stairs because, on the middle landing, stood Steve Rogers.

Bucky looked up at him.

Steve came to meet him, one step at a time. He moved just as carefully as the Soldier, and Bucky was terribly, exasperatedly grateful. Steve didn't try to touch him, and when he reached the bottom of the stairs, he stopped. This was new territory. The Soldier found Steve out and about. Sometimes arranged times and places. Usually not.

Bucky came looking for Steve at his base of operations. His temporary home. It should make Steve feel threatened, but Bucky knew he was the more vulnerable in this moment. Though he didn't break eye contact, he lowered his chin, clinging to his stoicism, but doubting its power. At the moment, he imagined he looked more like a kicked dog creeping toward a stranger's outstretched hand than a deadly weapon made flesh.

"Hi, Buck," Steve all but whispered.

_Тоска._

Two boys in Brooklyn and a girl in a red dress swept round and round as her mind was broken and purged.

His lip trembled and he gasped a quick breath, alarmed by the faint mist rising to obscure his vision. There must be something wrong with him. Perhaps Hydra had built a failsafe and he was dying, or it could be –

Something warm fell out of his eye. He stared at Rogers, terrified, as the wet thing slid down his face and hung, fighting gravity, on the stubble at his chin. It dropped, and he snapped his eyes down to see… nothing. He couldn't see any bloodstain on the carpet.

He'd thought he was dying, he still thought that. Maybe. He was malfunctioning. He couldn't –

And more warm tracks traced down his face.

He lifted a hand. Discovered…

tears.

He was crying.

"Bucky."

Bucky made no sound, but he suddenly heard a howl inside, screams and curses and threats.

Maybe he made a mistake coming here. But it was too late to bow out now. He must see this through. He no longer had a choice.

Voice cracking, he asked, "Can we… talk?"

Steve smiled. The expression was so very broken. It gave Bucky the last inch he needed to step back into a friendship preserved in mothballs and ice.

Steve nodded.

"Yeah, Buck. Let's talk."

.O.O.O.

She realized she could leave.

She hadn't planned. Hadn't considered. Hadn't waited. She simply picked through the things she kept from outside her perimeter. And she realized she had the way out.

3781.

The code to open the door through which the suits always came and went. It was the only door with a code. The front, the world outside her hall, was supposed to be… different.

She didn't understand.

But there were no other doors with numbers.

Not in the room where she sat across from the people with things in their minds the suits wanted out, where she watched their reflections in the gleaming steel table.

Not on the doors they passed every day.

No.

One other door had a code.

The room with the chair.

She could never remember that number. Maybe she didn't want to. She certainly didn't need to.

So she waited.

Sat at the table. Played her part. Sat back on her bed. Waited for the lights to dim.

Opened her door.

Went down the hall.

Fewer thoughts drifted through the building than when the lights in her room were bright. Usually they made a constant buzz, white noise. Not enough to overwhelm her on their own, though. Now the crackle of busy minds had softened to a few occasional mutters. She could almost understand.

Given the choice, she preferred to stay away from the suits.

Given?

Incorrect. She'd taken this choice.

She would make it.

Listening to the peripheral thoughts from the suits, she wandered through her hall. Other halls. Looked in doors without numbers. Found files. Found chairs. Tables. Found a janitor's closet. She took the cart, pushing it ahead, like it was a… shield.

She turned a corner, and a set of doors appeared. Two men, distracted by winking screens, sat in a glass room. They would see her. But she felt in their minds that these were the doors she wanted. She wanted to leave. She had to use these doors. So she proceeded down the hall, the cart rattling and squeaking. And the two men looked up.

She let her mouth hang open and murmured along with the conversation. There were few other thoughts. Both men were tired.

She was not.

"Shit. How'd she get out?"

"Beats me. Hey, darlin', we need to get you back, 'kay? Kay. Damn, she's worse than the parrot my brother had when we were kids. Taught that thing to swear like…"

"Gotta take her to the chair, idiot. Base reset. Protocol."

"Seriously? Been a while. New record, right?"

"Way new record. I'm going to get things set up. You handle her, okay? And see if you can figure out where that cart came from."

"Sure."

The man took her by the arm as the second trotted away, turned a corner, and gradually faded from the mash of information blurring her purpose and direction.

She struggled, for the first time, against the pull to leave her own ideas to report someone else's. It hurt. The man's thoughts were still there, even when she was within her own boundaries, and they clamored for release. She gave it to them, providing a channel straight to her mouth, where they spewed out. Immediately, the pressure eased, and though she still suffered from the strain, she managed to gather herself.

She found the man looking down at the cart, tapping his nails against the rim. She saw the shiny black thing on his hip that all the suits wore, and she knew, instinctively, that she wanted it. She'd wanted it… before? Helpless. She never wanted to be helpless again. Had wanted. Still wanted. And the suit wouldn't be happy if she took it.

But she was supposed to be empty. He was more worried about replacing the cart than keeping her contained. It gave her ideas.

When the suit grabbed the handle nearest him to swing the contraption around, she allowed a wheel to catch the back of her foot, sending her tumbling bonelessly into the suit. She made sure to take a few bottles down with her. They burst on impact with the floor, and the suit flailed, trying to get her back on her feet, but also reaching for the bottles leaking a multi-colored mess over the floor. She reached for the thing on his hip, righting herself, and pulled it away as the suit bent down to grab one of the ruptured containers.

Her hand fit around it. It must be made for hands to fit. Of course it was. She slipped her finger though a loop, lifted it, and tried not to wonder why her outline knew what to do more than her ideas did.

The suit returned the bottles to the cart with a groan, looked back at her, and paled. He lifted a hand, slowly, but the outline didn't wait for the suit to take away this thing she knew could protect her. She squeezed, and the thing in her hand erupted.

This was the thing the suits pointed at the people who sat across the table. The thing that made the red fly. She realized this as the suit's head opened.

Her hand began to shake so she couldn't hold the thing. It was the cost, she thought, of using it.

She doubled over to evict the last food she'd eaten, and then looked back at the doors.

Everything smeared. She did things she didn't know. Found things she didn't know how to use – and used them. She opened the doors, left the hallways and the suits.

The world outside was white.

And very cold.

She didn't think she had the things she needed. But she wouldn't go back in the halls to find them.

The air tasted different.

There was no ceiling.

Sky.

There was sky.

But everything was white. It seemed wrong, somehow, but the outline moved over the slippery places and the spots where she sank into the white like it knew what it was doing. So it must be okay.

She moved farther and farther away from the halls, and even as she lost feeling in her toes, she felt something alien and wonderful rising inside her.

She had a new word.

_Escape_.

She'd escaped.

She followed a long slope away from halls, trying to move as quickly as possible. Something under the snow caught her foot, and her momentum sent her tumbling. The snow wasn't deep enough to stop her. She rolled until she hit the bottom of the hill, where she lied still for several minutes, trying to process what had happened, how she should proceed. After a moment's reflection, she lifted her burning hands to her face. Scratched and raw. Painful to the touch. So were her knees. Her clothes had torn in several places, leaving her that much more exposed to the white and the cold.

But it wasn't all bad. The white gave way to a winding stripe of black here. Somehow, she thought that was a good thing. It gave her… direction.

By that point, she was shuddering so hard she could barely walk. But there were other suits. She didn't know if the suits could escape the hallways, but she didn't want to take any chances. So she continued. She fought on until she came across a long rectangle with doors and windows, and she thought it might be a building, only it stood on blocks above the ground. From what she understood, buildings were meant to sit on the ground. Sometimes, they even went under it.

An incredibly big sign stood across the road, posted high on a pole over a structure she _knew_ was a building. It read, _Alton Diner: Hot Food, Hot Coffee, Good Directions_. But the sign had lights.

_Bright_ – Why did that seem familiar?

The building above the ground seemed like a better choice, and the odd gap was actually a welcome oddity. It gave her a place to shelter from the worst of the moving air – the wind. It blocked the wind. That was good.

She was tired.

Maybe, if she stopped for a while, she could move faster later. With this hope in mind, she curled in on herself and slipped into the world beyond borders.

**A/N: Okay, so I keep getting questions in reviews that could be easily answered by events in the next chapter or two, or by more thorough author's notes about the creative choices in each chapter. Is that something you guys are interested in? Behind the scenes stuff? Because I'd be happy to provide that if you'd like, but I know cumbersome author's notes can also turn people off. Don't know. You tell me. **

**Very late post, but I was torn about where to split the chapter. Needless to say, I have quite a bit of the next post already drafted. Hopefully I can get the next update out by this weekend. *Hopefully.***

**Replies to Anons:**

**Adriana: Thank you very, very much! Glad you're enjoying the story. Bucky has a LOT to sort through, and I only see him going to Steve when he hits into something he has no way of dealing with. When he needs direct back up. So that's what brought him to Steve in this chapter. They won't be all fluffy and cute after this, don't get me wrong. And, yeah, he isn't thinking "I'm a bad man, let's kiss and make up." He has no handler. Steve is as close as he has. He doesn't know how to deal with certain things on his own yet, so Steve it is. Thanks again, and I hope you enjoyed the latest chapter!**

**Inkwriter: Thanks for the review! And I'm sorry for your unfortunate period of isolation. That rips. I've been there, and I was climbing the walls. Thanks, thanks, and thanks again!**

**Sah: Hello! Thanks, as always, for a charming review. Sorry about school, though. I hope your path smooths a bit. You were surprised! Yay! I hope you enjoyed this chapter, and thanks again for all your support.**


	18. 18

**Disclaimer: One author + gratuitous amounts of fanfiction = no legal rights to the original canon work. **

.18.

At first, she thought the snow had followed her into the dream.

In another moment, she realized the texture was all wrong. She found herself standing in a field of ashes where crumbling ends of a ruined building poked out like boulders. There must have been a fire. Nothing but a wasteland now.

The ash and soot drifted in the air, gradually floating down to cling to her.

Bleached and dead. All of it.

She _needed_ to get it off. She brushed at the flecks, but they only smeared on her hands.

Water fell, then, from the white sky. She looked up, blinking against the rain, but saw nothing beyond the deluge. It felt nice. Familiar. She closed her eyes. It bathed the ash from her skin, her hair. She relaxed into it and felt her cares ease.

Simple.

Pure.

Clean.

_Familiar_.

She looked up, and a man stood across the rubble, watching her. She stumbled back. The rain followed her. It wasn't just a man – it was a _Soldier_. Battle armor over one arm and a combat vest. Ratty hair and a blank stare.

Only not so blank.

He saw her.

He looked around, like he was trying to get his bearings. He chuffed his boot in the ashes. Crouched. Rubbed them between the fingers of his armored limb. No. Not armored. His arm _was_ metal.

He looked back up at her. Like she had the answers.

"What is this place?"

She hated to disappoint him. The answer seeped out of her. She wasn't even sure she spoke. "I don't know."

She realized the rain had stopped, and just like that, she was freezing. The droplets on her skin hardened, burned, and her hair grew stiff over her shoulders. Trembling, she curled in on herself. Moaning in fear and confusion.

"No." The soldier didn't sound panicked, only firm. But she noticed the metal hand fisting at his side. The whirring machinery spoke of a fear he couldn't voice. His eyes were so wide, she thought the whole world might fall inside them.

That fear was like an echo. Folded time, touching things that used to be. _Memory_. That was the word. She tried to feel pleased with the discovery, but she couldn't hold the feeling. The ice on her arms was spreading like frost across her body, and her knees buckled, sending her to the ground in a puff of ash.

The Soldier came to kneel beside her, but he hesitated to touch her.

She wished he would. He looked warm. At least compared to her.

She blinked. Frozen lashes scratched her cheeks.

And she saw, towering above them, the bright sign across the road from her hiding place.

_Alton Diner: Hot Food, Hot Coffee, Good Directions. _

The Soldier looked, too. His shoulders tensed, but his fist relaxed. He leaned over her, a hand flat to the ground on either side of her head, trying to claim her attention by dominating her field of view. He must know she was slipping… trying to sleep away the cold.

"Alton. Are you in Alton?"

She wasn't in the sign. Hadn't bled into the paint. Ridiculous.

Her lips felt chapped and stiff. She struggled to answer. But she didn't want to disappoint him… "Across the road. Under the – something. Sheltering."

He didn't relinquish his position, and the scowl on his face _demanded_ more.

She could try. Just a little longer. "Escaped." There, that was a good word. Maybe that was what he needed.

Apparently it was. He looked back at the sign.

"Alton. You're in Alton."

Too sleepy to try anymore. "If you say so…"

Jolted by her slurring words, the Soldier abandoned his qualms and grabbed her shoulders. "What else? Where were they holding you?" He shook his head. "No, just – just stay where you are. Hal, stay there. We can…"

But she was full of ashes, burning cold, and she didn't have ears to hear.

.O.O.O.

On the whole, Steve preferred Coulson to Fury. Once he'd recovered from the shock of seeing the world's most polite agent living and breathing – and once he'd gotten used to the idea of a man Coulson's age holding Captain America as a childhood idol – he'd discovered the new Director's appeals for a better, more honest SHIELD were actually taken seriously. Steve tried not to kid himself. Coulson was a spy. The man knew how to work the cloak and dagger routine. But Steve liked to pretend that the cloak had been downgraded to a nice suit jacket, and the dagger swapped out for a letter opener. If the rumors he heard were anything to go by, Coulson could take on the world's problems just fine with such downgrades. Steve's favorite story about Coulson involved a bag of flour. Supposedly there was video evidence. Maybe, once things had settled down (did they ever?) he would ask a friend more capable with modern computers to help him dig through SHIELD's leaked files and find the footage. If it even existed.

Some things were just too good to be true.

And even though he liked Coulson better than Fury (there, he'd admitted it), discussions still took a frustratingly long time to reach their point. And Coulson only gave out information on a need to know basis. If Steve didn't ask the right questions, Coulson simply assumed he didn't need to know. So Steve had to worry an issue from every possible direction before he had any confidence he'd shaken all the intel loose.

But, every once in a while, Coulson skipped straight to the point.

The Director walked into the briefing room where Steve sat waiting with the Director's personal team. The super soldier was trying very hard to ignore the way the girls in the room – Agent May excepted – had been not-so-discretely ogling him. The Director's entrance made a welcome distraction.

Then the man dropped a stack of files on the table, and Steve wondered how serious an issue must be to make the man frown so deeply.

Coulson scanned the room, making eye contact with everyone there.

"Someone has been abducting low level agents from secured SHIELD facilities for the past six months."

Agent Skye, the precocious Queen of the Oglers suddenly had something better to do than eye Steve's arms. "Anything in common? New project?"

Coulson assumed his seat at the table. "You could say that."

The openness had been nice while it lasted. Steve leaned forward to rest his elbows on the table and allowed some of his earlier frustration to come out in his voice. "Care to explain, or do we have to guess?"

"Each agent came from a different department, a different program, and a different team. All had low clearance levels." He kept talking as Agent Simmons leaned across the table and helped herself to a file. Steve did likewise, grabbing three and laying them out side by side. As he perused, he decided Coulson might not be playing vague on purpose. There was really very little to tie these targets together. Not age, race, exact clearance rating, living areas, marital status, pets, projects – anything.

"However," Coulson flipped open the remaining files and tapped at seemingly random points in the lists of assignments, "all of them had at least one piece of information the right person with the right network could paste together into something useful. The missing agents had seen files with coordinates to new bases currently in development, a name or two off our updated watch list, scraps of our most heavily classified data. Information we didn't have about half a year ago."

And there it was. The reason Coulson yanked him, specifically, away from hunt for Hydra. He felt the hopeful frustration begin to rise anew. "Information Hal didn't have access to. No point dancing around the issue."

Agent Skye jumped into the fray. "So – what? You think they got what they could from her and are trying to updating their intelligence?"

No one wanted to ask the real question: _Have they bled Hal dry and tossed her in a shallow grave?_

Coulson's shoulders rose as he took a deep breath in preparation for his answer. He rubbed a hand over his face, and Steve was reminded, yet again, that this man was not Fury. Hal's disappearance had hurt him. Still did. "That is one possibility we can't ignore. I want to clarify that there are other factors to consider. For instance, nearly all the agents who've vanished worked under the old agency. We cleared them all of Hydra ties, but we still have a lot of confidence to regain in our internal affairs. I remember a particular incident that ended with three Helicarriers in the Potomac."

Steve weighed his options, tried to reason out the best course of action. Bucky told him about his dreams with Hal. That day in the safe house, when he turned up out of nowhere, exhausted, confused, they sat down with two cups of coffee neither of them drank, and Bucky told him about the girl in red on a merry-go-round with eyes he saw in his own mirror. Steve hadn't wanted to call it wishful thinking. Honestly, he was pretty damn wishful, too. And he was living proof that the world was full of strange things. But this seemed too good to be true. Maybe if he could have had the same dream. If Coulson or his team had the dream. But Bucky… Of course, the dreams could be real. Hal could, somehow, be reaching out to a man she only half-remembered, according to the vision. This could be their big break. This could be her distress signal.

He had to give it a try. At worst, Coulson and his team would feel a little more sympathetic for the man who'd tried to kill their former Director. Twice.

He looked down at his hands. "I might have some information about Hal. But it's a little… shaky."

Coulson set his jaw, and Agent Simmons reached discretely for Skye's hand.

"If you have information, no matter how _shaky_, we'd love to hear it, Captain," Coulson said.

So he told them everything. The way Bucky shook as his eyes glassed over and he recounted the bizarre world of the dream Coney Island. The girl on the carousel. Bright. Memories of other, older dreams, where Hal sat in the background, silent. Steve watched the faces around him distort under the pressure of too many emotions. Hope. Fear. Guilt. In cases like these, everyone wondered what else they could've done. He'd seen similar cases in the war, soldiers wondering if they could've saved a life by being faster, smarter, tougher. Coulson looked like someone had stabbed a pen in his foot. Tense misery.

That meant Coulson believed it. All of it. Despite the source. Despite the condition of the subject. And that meant…

"You know something else." Steve didn't mean it as an accusation, but Coulson closed his eyes as the words struck. That was all the confirmation Steve needed.

"I do."

"So this is real," Agent Simmons said. "You believe Hal has gained telepathy. Sir, I know she's unusual, but…"

Steve raised his eyebrows. "Unusual?"

"Her memory?" Coulson looked him square in the eye. Held the contact. Steve got the idea he was being brought up to speed on subjects the rest of the class learned last semester. "It's a mutation. A natural anomaly in her genetic make-up."

Steve balked. "Natural? Not like…?"

"Doctor Banner?" Coulson smiled. "No. She's a mutant. Not the result of gamma radiation."

"And she knew this?"

The eye contact died. Coulson turned to the stack of open files, his expression closing. "Yes and no."

Simmons looked like she'd swallowed something unpleasant. "Sir?"

"She knew she was a mutant." Coulson stopped. Tapped his fingers on the table. Then he plunged ahead, his words rushing so close together, Steve almost failed to understand him. "However, Fury never told her the nature of her mutation."

"And that would be?"

All eyes were on the Director as he sorted through his answer. This time, the words leaked slowly. "Her mutation is entirely unique. Her brain… changes. Mutants are born with special abilities, sometimes marked differences from non-mutants, but those are established during development in the womb. By the time they're born, their abilities have already been determined. They do not change once they are activated. But Hal's mutation is that she _continues to evolve_. We don't know why, or what triggers a new ability, but, no, it isn't at all impossible that she developed a way into Sergeant Barnes' dreams."

"And Hal doesn't know?" Skye asked incredulously. "She could just wake up as Carrie one day and have no idea why?"

Coulson shook his head. "Not suddenly. Change takes time. Which would explain why she's only now learned to speak in the dreams. I'm more concerned over how quickly she's developed. Something must have happened. I think Sergeant Barnes may be right. Hydra might be trying to turn her into a new weapon, or working on a new prototype of the device used on Barnes…"

Agent Triplett, silent up to that point, groaned and scoured his face with his hands. "Now _my_ head hurts. Shit."

Before anyone could figure out a more fitting response, Steve's cell phone rang. He pawed blindly at his pocket, ignoring Skye's snicker as he finally fished it free and accepted the call. He'd given up on caller ID. Bucky disliked using the same phone more than once or twice. Old habits died hard.

"Rogers."

"_Steve. I think I know where to find Hal_."

Natasha and Sam both knew a neat little trick where they could make their phones broadcast to a larger audience, but Steve was still happy when he didn't accidently hit the wrong part of the screen with his ear and drop a call.

"Bucky? Did you have another dream? Where…?"

"_She's in Maine. Alton, Maine. I've looked it up and I recognize… She showed me. In another dream. She escaped. I'm on my way there._"

"I'm with SHIELD." Steve wasn't sure if Bucky would like that, but at this stage, he had to be honest with his friend or risk losing him altogether. He didn't want to surprise the ex-assassin with an entire team of specialists. "We can meet you there."

"_Hurry_."

He didn't like how easily Bucky had accepted SHIELD's assistance. It could be respect for the organization Hal worked for. More likely, he was expecting a fight.

Steve looked up to meet the room full of eyes pinning him in his seat.

No point beating around the bush.

"Bucky had another dream. He's found Hal."

.O.O.O.

It was either very wrong or very right.

She found herself under the Maybe Building, the world just as white as she'd left it. Snow. Not ash.

But the man from her dream was there. The soldier.

She struggled to focus. The world felt unstable, like she could smear it with a finger. Only the soldier crouched before her seemed at all concrete, and she reached for him, extending beyond her own perimeter voluntarily. He was real. He was not real. She'd seen him before, but she'd never really known him.

But there was a word, she thought, for occasions like this.

She paused, trying to mold her lips around the sound.

"Hello."

The Soldier nodded, moving with an air of severest gravity. "Hello." The word left him as reluctantly as it left her, and for some reason, that was comforting.

He pulled her out from under the Maybe Building, and she lied very carefully so he wouldn't see the pain it caused her. She remembered something blurry about a tree on the way down the slope. She knew for _sure_ she hurt where the suit kicked her a few weeks back. If the soldier touched her much more, she might fail to maintain the lie.

His palm ghosted over her side as he tugged her free of her shelter, and she gasped. Her vision grew even more misty, and she peered up at the soldier, terrified, vulnerable. She couldn't lie. Would he send her back to the chair?

But his mind was so close, she had the answers before she even considered the question. He wasn't angry. He didn't feel the frustration the suits always suffered, the practiced resignation, as they drew her back to the chair. Not at all. The soldier wasn't at all like that. He felt something else when he saw through her lie. It was old and deep and painful. Things she could sense but not entirely understand. He felt…

"_Тоска._"

He started at the word, staring down at her with… what? Fear? Hate?

She'd extended too far past her own borders. Some thoughts were his, some were hers, but she couldn't differentiate them anymore. Her precious sense of self was slipping. Horrified, she yanked her probing ideas back to her core, curling up in a ball to protect them. Or, at least, she tried to curl. Her body wouldn't respond. Her hands twitched. Her knees spasmed. But she'd lost control.

This was dangerously wrong. Her body told her things she didn't comprehend, but she realized, in one awful moment of clarity, that she was in very real danger.

Her borders fluttered. The soldier leaned in.

And he lifted her from the snow, cradling her to his chest.

His mind pressed against hers. Overwhelming. Comforting.

He recognized something. Not just her face. He grasped something just beyond her understanding. Repetition and nightmares. A hollow like the empty chamber of a revolver, full of burning smoke left behind by damage sent out. Empty. Sick.

A word.

Heartbreak.

His breath was warm on her ear. "Stay awake."

She tried, for a while, to use his mind as a safety net to keep her from falling into dreams again. He thought the danger grew when she slept. And, somehow, it felt like he tried to hold her there. His arms around her body. His thoughts around her mind. But not even he could keep her conscious forever, and the cold sang such an enchanting lullaby.

**A/N: I freakin' love you people.**

**This chapter wasn't as long as I planned, but family kept me much busier over the weekend than I initially bargained for. That said, the next chapter should be out by the weekend (I say this a lot, don't I? Ah, well, promises, promises...)because I already have the whole thing planned, and it's gonna be a doozy. At the end, I will post an A/N of epic proportions. Because we will clear the spoilers I've been waiting out.**

**Replies to Anons:**

**littlewolf: Thank you very much for the review! What lovely compliments. I really enjoyed writing the scene with Steve and Bucky. I haven't allowed myself to make their reconciliation easy, so this little moment was just such great fun to write. Such a relief. Thanks again, and I hope you enjoyed the latest chapter!**

**Sah: Thanks so much for your review! I'm unspeakably pleased that I both surprised and delighted you. I'm having fun with the twists and turns the story is taking, so I'm happy you're enjoying the ride, too! Thanks again, and I hope you liked this chapter!**


	19. 19

**Disclaimer: I don't own Marvel, but right now I really wish I owned more coffee. **

.19.

Steve didn't know what he'd expected to find when he reached Alton – fire, blood, chaos, _nothing_ – but it wasn't Bucky walking down the side of the road, coming to meet Captain America and the agents of SHIELD with Hal's limp body in his arms.

He sprang out of his vehicle before the tires had even skidded to a halt on the icy road. Director Coulson was a hairsbreadth behind him, and Steve heard the murmur of wordless gratitude the other man offered as he realized what, exactly, was in Barnes' arms. Of course, things could never be that easy. As they approached, Steve saw the angry flush of frostbite over Hal's exposed hands and feet, and he could see by the tightness in Bucky's jaw that Hal's apparent sleep was not a good thing.

Coulson had his gloves off before he even reached his former associate, and he gave orders even as he slipped the gloves over Hal's hands.

"Make room in the back of the van for Sergeant Barnes and Miss Renold. Jemma, I want you back there, too. Skye, grab a blanket. We need to get Hal to a medical facility immediately. She has severe hypothermia, and this frostbite looks serious."

"How far is the nearest hospital?" Steve asked. He looked at his friend. Looked at the girl in his arms. Wondered what it would do to Bucky if he came this close to saving her and failed.

He heard the same foreboding urgency in Coulson's voice. "Not close enough. There's a SHIELD facility a few miles off. Skye – have May and Tripp meet us there, and tell them to bring the Bus as close as possible. We might need to move her once she's more stable." He turned back toward the van, speaking over his shoulder as he pulled open the door. "It's a small base. Barely more than a safe house, used as a launch point for a lot of northern missions. Hasn't seen a lot of action lately."

"Yeah, well," Steve peered around at the dense forest pressing in on the road, "that might be about to change." Hal couldn't have gotten far in her condition. Hydra must be close. In the town itself, probably. They needed to be ready for an ambush.

Bucky gave him a frown grimmer than his customary Soldier glower. He must have thought the same thing. No wonder he didn't argue about backup. Alone, Steve had no doubt he and Bucky could clear the Hydra nest. An injured comrade, however, complicated matters. For Hal's sake, they needed to retreat to a secure location.

They'd come back for Hydra.

Taking orders for the first time since the Triskelion, Bucky clambered into the back of the SHIELD van, clutching Hal to his chest like a child's doll. Steve grimaced. The girl had always been tiny. Now she was downright emaciated. Her figure was lost in the oversized scrubs she wore. And she was so damn _pale_. He prayed the snow and ice hadn't taken something else from him. First his natural life. Then his best friend's choice, will, and identity.

Winter was his least favorite season.

By unspoken agreement, Steve assumed a place in the backseat, where he could intervene if Bucky decided he didn't like the situation.

Agent Simmons scrambled in beside Bucky, far less gracefully, and immediately reached for her patient. Simmons pried open Hal's eyelids, checked her pulse, and swore. Her accent made it sound worse, somehow. It reminded Steve of Peggy.

But he didn't have time to reminisce. And the swearing was probably a bad sign.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

Simmons didn't even glance at him. "She isn't sleeping. She's unconscious. Severe hypothermia. I can't say for sure about the frostbite, but it looks bad." Without another word, she whipped out a pair of scissors from her kit and took them to the hem of Hal's ratty scrub top.

Bucky jerked away, eyes on the scissors, practically crushing Hal to his chest. The action was instinct. But the way he moved, the boneless elegance of an assassin, reminded everyone with whom, exactly, gentle little Agent Simmons shared the back.

For an instant, Steve thought it was a really good thing he sat in the rear.

Simmons retreated, hands in the air. Steve could tell she was holding her breath, but when Bucky didn't immediately lash out, she carefully lowered her hands as she inhaled. Eyes wide, but voice soft, Simmons said, "She's been lying in the snow for hours. We have to get those clothes off and wrap her in something warm. Otherwise, the cold might still kill her." Her eyes flickered to Bucky's arms. "You can hold her again once I'm finished. Honestly, your body heat will probably help safely raise her temperature."

"They're good people, Buck," Steve assured him. He understood why his friend didn't want to surrender the woman he'd assumed as his personal responsibility. She was his _mission_. Even if Steve couldn't grasp the entirety of Buvky's tortured psyche, he knew about missions. He understood how important it was as a soldier. The weight of another life in his hands – saving _or_ taking. And the Winter Soldier didn't share responsibility lightly. Didn't trust so easily, either. But he trusted Steve. Steve hoped that would be enough.

And it was.

Almost grudgingly, Bucky shed the worst of his tension and laid Hal carefully on the van's floor. Simmons swooped down again with her scissors and magicked away the tattered scrubs. She had Hal stripped, dry, and sheathed in a blanket with an efficiency Steve would've assumed was military if he didn't know better.

Bucky resumed his burden before Simmons cleared her, and the agent had to work around his arms in order to re-check vitals and search for further damage.

As Simmons continued her examination, her fingers worked their way up to Hal's scalp, and she made a noise halfway between a gurgle and a sigh, something only a trained medical professional could pull off. She lifted a lank tress from behind Hal's ear, revealing a shiny pink scar. Further investigation revealed several others hidden around the patient's skull.

Simmons, still focused on the immediate danger of hypothermia, took a moment to put the pieces together. "What in the world made these?"

Steve heard fake leather creaking under his grip on the back of the seat. Had he ripped it? He couldn't bring himself to care.

Bucky spoke up for the first time since he'd climbed into the van. "They're using an old machine." He didn't acknowledge the eyes that simultaneously turned to him. Not even Steve's. "The burns. They're from an older model of the chair." He paused, and Steve couldn't tell what he was thinking. "I destroyed the latest."

Skye, up front with Coulson, smacked the window. "Shit." She turned to her commanding officer and asked the question that had been burning on Steve's tongue since Bucky first revealed his suspicion of brainwashing. "Why destroy all that intel? I don't get it. What were they trying to do?"

"I don't know." _And I don't like it._ Coulson didn't have to say it. His tone delivered it for him. "Maybe they didn't steal her for information."

"Then why would they start taking your agents so shortly after Hal's abduction?" Steve asked.

Coulson turned off the main road and onto a narrow track that wound up a hill in endless circles. "Good question."

"Maybe they were covering their tracks?" Simmons clearly didn't believe that hypothesis even as she presented it.

Coulson shook his head. "Then why not kill her?"

No one had the answer, and soon Bucky's stony silence spread like Medusa's curse throughout the van. As they crested the hill, quiet sat heavy between them, breathing the confusion of the past year, the fear that every friend wore a mask to conceal an enemy. They'd fought so hard. After all they'd accomplished, was Hydra still creeping through their ranks?

An office building loomed ahead, a low, single story compound embraced by trees designed to hide its true size. A sign out front read "Quality Health Support Northern." Steve hoped that was SHIELD code for an infirmary.

In the back, Hal spasmed, and Bucky tightened his grip as she launched into body-wracking shivers. Simmons leaned over, resting her hand against Hal's forehead, and smiled.

"Finally. She's started shivering." Petting back Hal's hair, she looked up to Bucky's face. "This means her body's recovering. Shivering is an involuntary response to cold, the body's way of warming itself. Progress. Good work, Sergeant."She spoke to Bucky like he was her patient's family, Steve realized.

He wondered whose benefit that was for, if Simmons wanted to give the former assassin a role she had better practice addressing, or if her consideration stemmed from Bucky's ties to Captain America – who sat overseeing the whole affair. Steve wanted to believe the concern was for his friend, but he realized he didn't trust anyone else with Bucky. Not yet. Bucky was still so fragile. The fact that Bucky was alive at all was a miracle, a twisted one, and while he ached for the nightmares his friend had lived, the atrocities Hydra bent his hands to commit, Steve was happy to welcome his friend. Miracles, however, rarely happened twice, and Steve wasn't about to gamble with his.

The van stopped, and Steve pressed out first so he could swing around and open the back. Bucky climbed down, and Hal's bare feet, chapped and red with frostbite, swung over his arm. Simmons popped out behind them, trilling on about the damage to Hal's ribs, and dithering about whether or not Bucky should just put her down while they got a stretcher to hold her. And Steve reconsidered his earlier assumptions. Maybe this was simply the British agent's natural manner under fire. After all, he'd never been in the field with Coulson's team before.

Bucky, however, didn't wait for Simmons to make up her mind. He had his mission in his arms. The rest of them were backup. Even though Steve got the reputation for stubbornness as a kid, Bucky had never had a very soft skull, either.

Bucky kicked in the door and they all followed him into the lobby. An alarm squealed to life as they filed over the broken glass, and a young man in a neatly pressed suit sprang from behind a desk, gun drawn.

Coulson ran to the front. "Stand down!" He raised his hands – both empty – and the agent with the gun hesitated just long enough to realize at whom he was aiming.

The agent holstered his gun so quickly he nearly dropped it. "Director!"

"We have a medical emergency. Do you have any doctors on staff?"

After a gape-mouthed instant scanning the crowd assembled in front of him, the agent licked his lips and reached for the desk phone. "Yeah, yeah. They aren't usually in at this hour, but – accident earlier – had to call some folks in and…" He stopped mumbling long enough to punch a few buttons and lift the receiver. His next words came over the loudspeaker. "_Position A reporting a Code S. All available medical personnel to Position A. Code S. Medical personnel to Position A."_

Steve heard footsteps pounding down the hallway before the little agent even finished speaking. Good response time, he'd give them that.

A flurry of activity erupted, focused primarily around Bucky and the unconscious girl in his arms. Nearly all the staff wore suits, but one man wore a white lab coat, leading Steve to assume he was the doctor. In their rush to the front, no one had brought a stretcher, so they led Bucky – and, inadvertently, the rest of the team – to a room in the back with a cot and a cabinet full of medical supplies. Simmons attached herself to the man in the lab coat, reporting her discoveries from the van in rapid-fire descriptions.

True to his programming, Bucky didn't hesitate. He strode into the room as the doctor said and deposited his burden as indicated.

However, even as Steve watched Bucky lay Hal on the cot, step away, and surrender her to the staff, he felt the mission wasn't over. There were still too many questions to just walk away – Who had done this to Hal? Where had they kept her? Could she tell them anything? – but it wasn't any kind of logic that stirred his disquiet. It was Bucky's eyes. His whole face. Bucky's expression was one good twitch away from a snarl.

Steve could see the Soldier guiding this mission.

The doctor reexamined Hal, treating her with a reassuring measure of care. "You did very well, Agent Simmons. And I'll need to do x-rays to be sure, but it looks like a rib or two might be cracked." His eyes swept the room. "I'd like to get started as soon as possible…"

The hint trailed into a silent order, and Coulson's team shuffled out of the room. Steve put his hand on Bucky's shoulder, then looked at the doctor.

"Will she be alright?"

The doctor smiled. "Always hopeful, sir. Only thing I ever gave up on were the Yankees."

Steve nodded, barely paying attention. Even though his eyes weren't on his friend, his thoughts were. "Glad to hear it."

He went to the door and waited until Bucky followed, slipped past him, and began his silent way down the hall. Like a ghost.

He closed the door behind them.

.O.O.O.

In true American fashion, the staff brought coffee for their guests. Young, awkward agents in suits bore in steaming cups and packets of sugar. After some more thought, they brought creamer as well. No one finished a single serving, because as soon as the drink sank below the halfway mark, someone appeared to top it off.

If SHIELD folded again, the folks at this particular base could make a killing – so to speak – as waiters.

Steve got the idea this was the most action the base had ever seen. Besides those who had helped with Hal, a number of other agents had appeared, probably summoned from their beds at home if their unkempt hair and glazed expressions were anything to go by. Summoned to make a good impression on the Director and his pal, Captain America.

Once upon a time, he might have thought it was all pretty funny.

Too bad Hydra had ruined that for him.

Now all he could see was the abnormality of it all. Agents called in to deal with, perhaps, a threat rather than a blessing. Keeping the outsiders busy, filling every need before asked so their company would stay where they were told. Though he kept his smile fixed, he kept his eyes open. And he wasn't the only one.

Bucky, of course, assumed a corner and glared passively. He didn't accept any coffee, but he didn't make any moves against his hosts.

Coulson's team took in more caffeine than Steve was entirely sure was safe, so much Skye became physical twitchy. Twitchier, at any rate.

Simmons shuddered and murmured something about tea. No sooner had the wish left her lips than the newbie assigned to them scampered off to make her dreams come true.

Coulson shifted back, a maneuver Steve immediately read as too casual for spontaneity. He was prepared when the Director leaned his way, rubbing his upper lip in a thoughtful pose in order to foil any lip readers observing the security feed.

"Something's off."

"Yeah," Steve took a half-step to the side, disguising his sweep of the room as boredom. He lifted his coffee cup, untouched until now, to his lips. "No one has come to report to you yet."

"And they said they had an accident – something they needed doctors for." Coulson tapped his jaw with his thumb. "That would require a report. I should've received an alert already. It's part of our updated protocol."

"Informal base?" Steve suggested. "You said yourself it doesn't see a lot of action."

Shaking his head, Coulson took a sip from his own cup. "What's bothering me is that they have us sequestered so close to the front. This is all façade. There's a real lab in the back and some secure briefing rooms. I said the place was small, but I never said it was useless. I'm awfully curious why we haven't been invited on the grand tour yet."

The door opened, and the agent returned with a cup of tea for Simmons and a pot of coffee to top up everyone else. Coulson asked about Hal, just as he had every fifteen minutes for the past hour, maintaining his role of concerned superior. Steve genuinely hoped it wasn't an act. He believed Coulson had real feelings for his team, and Hal had been awfully close to being part of it. If nothing else, Steve knew the burden of responsibility Coulson carried was real enough. He could almost see it as physical baggage strapped on the man's shoulders.

Coulson rubbed his eyes, and Steve wondered how long it would take for their hosts to give up and just leave a coffee maker in the room.

Simmon's stifled a yawn, and Skye stepped up to distract their supposed guard. "Hey, you got any food in this place? Because, seriously, who pulls an all-nighter without junk food?"

The agent muttered something about back-woods Maine, nothing but gas stations open so late, and left, tapping away at his smart phone.

Steve went to ask Coulson what their next step should be just when the Director's knees buckled. He leaped forward, managing to grab the Director's elbows before hit the ground.

"Knew something was off," Coulson muttered.

"What is it?"

"Coffee. I think. This might've been… a bad idea."

Steve peered over his shoulder to find Coulson's team in a similar state.

Fortunately, Simmons had been seated when the drug took effect, and she'd done nothing but slump sideways in her seat. Skye, however, had a long slide down the wall as her eyes lost focus.

"Oh no," she said, voice unnaturally soft. "You don't screw with an girl's coffee."

The door crashed open, but the five agents who pushed through were dead before they could get off a shot. Steve knew without looking that Bucky had left his corner. Bucky came to stand at his side, a submachine gun pointed toward the door. As Steve helped the semi-comatose Director behind an impromptu barricade of the couch, end tables, and the splintered door, Bucky kept the only point of ingress covered.

Steve rushed to pull the rest of the team to shelter. Simmons was out cold. Skye kept dipping in and out of consciousness, swearing and snoring by turns. Once he had them reasonably sheltered, he pulled out Skye's comm. and prayed their backup hadn't walked into an ambush.

"Agent May, do you copy?"

Four seconds of static answered. Then, "_I copy. What's your situation?"_

"The base is compromised." He hefted his shield came around to stand by Bucky. "Coulson, Skye, and Simmons are down. Appear stable, but unconscious. Suspected sedative. Base personnel are hostile." He paused. "I don't suggest using the front door."

"_Understood. What is your position?"_

He glanced at Bucky, and he couldn't help a cocky little smile. "Secure." He eyed the long hall beyond the empty doorframe. "Agent Renold is not at our position. Last seen in the east side of the building."

Agent Triplett took over the other end of the comm. "_We copy. One minute out. Can you get the casualties to an exit?"_

Steve met Bucky's eyes. Bucky had gone into full Soldier mode again, and he gave a clipped nod.

"Affirmative."

"_We're on our way. Over and out."_

Bucky took the door off the barricade and punched a hole through the pressed wood. Following his train of thought, Steve ripped the power cords off a pair of lamps. As he knotted them together and looped the new tether through the hole in the door, Bucky pulled Coulson onto the impromptu sled. Steve helped him load Simmons and Skye. All ready, they made their way out of the trap. Bucky took point, annihilating what little resistance they met.

Just like old times. Their memories went deeper than muscle – they lived in the bone. He had always fought next to Bucky. In back alleys, facing down bullies. In their crumby apartment, facing a sudden asthma attack. In Germany, against Hydra. Teamwork came naturally now, even if they dynamics of their relationship had changed. It gave Steve hope that, someday, he could win back more than a comrade. One day, he might reclaim his friend.

Their biggest challenge on their way out of the base was a heavy fire escape door, electronically dead bolted, but it was no match for Bucky's cybernetic arm. The Soldier peeled the metal back like foil. The frigid night air rushed in, and Steve bit the inside of his cheek.

Damn the winter.

As they carried Coulson and his team out of the building, headlights appeared, winding up the hill. Steve tapped the comm. "Agent May, we have visual. We are on the south side of the building."

"_Copy that."_

"Over and out."

.O.O.O.

Black and white and red all over.

Her first thoughts.

Blurred shapes she knew instinctively – _viscerally – _were suits.

He'd taken her back. He'd brought her to the white halls. And how _could_ he? How could he? She could see into him, and he'd never even thought of the white halls. How had he known? And why? She remembered, in the world without borders, that her escape affected him. Had she read him wrong?

Had he lied?

She always lied. It made her proud. But his lie? It hurt in her center, twisting, sharp.

Pain too great to lie. She tried to make words, find a name to call, but she could only cry. It was enough.

The suits moved around her.

"…coming to. Keep her quiet. We don't want _him_…"

A suit stuck a needle in her arm, and she felt something cold wend its way into her bloodstream. Like blood in the water. Only her heart was _pumping_, and that stuff spread _fast_, and already she was groggy, unfocused, losing herself.

"We have to do this now. It could take months to build another… complete the procedure and move her out through the front…"

The suits would put her back in the chair, and she'd scream, and then she wouldn't be there, and she _remembered_.

_Crackling agony arcing behind her eyes. Sparks setting fires in her head and that sudden endless burning. Burning her memories. Burning her._

Ashes.

Ashes.

They all fell down.

She wouldn't let it happen again.

She opened her mind as wide as she could and _screamed_.

.O.O.O.

Steve kept glancing at the road, trying to estimate how far they would need to carry Coulson and his team through the woods. Maybe a hundred yards. Not far. But if they were pursued, one lucky bullet could destroy SHIELD all over again. Without Coulson, the organization would flounder, and a leaderless SHIELD would be dangerous. Vulnerable. Ripe for infiltration, corruption, and splintering. He watched the twin beams cutting their way through the forest anxiously.

Bucky wasn't watching the headlights. He had his eyes fixed on the yawning black mouth leading back into the supposed SHIELD base. Steve could hear the cybernetic arm whine as Bucky wrapped his hand into a fist.

Steve didn't need to ask what he was thinking. Only a few minutes, and the casualties would be safe. Then they could go back.

"They weren't prepared." He tried to catch Bucky's eye, but his friend was too focused on the broken door. Or what was beyond it. "We'll get her out again, but first we need to…"

His mind exploded in a cacophony of sound and images. _Black and white and red all over. _Broken lies. Terrible truth. Snow and lightning. Pain sizzled along words scattered by fear. Terror in the face of death. And – _Don't let them take me away again_.

He surfaced, gasping, and found himself on his knees, hands clapped to his head. Between rattling thoughts, derailed by the assault, he picked out a name. Not his. Hers.

Hal.

That was _Hal_.

Which meant…

He groped through the snow, blinking to clear his vision. "Bucky? Buck!"

But his friend was already a shadow, vanishing into the abyss beyond the door.

.O.O.O.

Director Coulson had grown used to rough mornings. Mornings after missions. Mornings before funerals. This morning would tally among the worst in his life. He sat at his desk, staring at the files his people had recovered from the rogue base after the Winter Soldier tore a path of destruction through the halls. The sedative had left a wicked headache in its wake, and neither coffee nor alcohol could blunt it. He needed some natural sleep, but he wouldn't be able to rest until he'd made sense of all this.

If he could ever make sense of it.

While May and Triplet carted their vulnerable teammates to safety, a secondary team had joined Captain Rogers at the facility. Rogers had waited a precious few minutes until Coulson and his team were safe before he went after Barnes. In those few minutes, Barnes had disappeared, but not before he killed every agent in the building and tore apart a machine horribly similar to images Coulson had seen of Hydra's brainwashing technology. The sergeant's suspicions, then, had been proven.

And that wasn't the worst thing his agents had pulled from the base's files.

For starters, the base wasn't really SHIELD's. Not for a while. As Coulson paged through the information, he watched angry, frightened agents fall away from SHIELD in the wake of the Triskelion's fall. Even as Coulson had struggled to rebuild, they had pursued their own path, blaming Hydra's infiltration on innate weaknesses in SHIELD. Hal's identity as the Compendium had ceased to be a secret the moment Hydra discovered it. Captured operatives tattled, gossiped, and traded information. Hal's discovery had been inevitable, so Coulson had made no effort to hide her from his own people. He'd hoped it would make her easier to accept. He'd been wrong.

The rogue cell called themselves H.A.M.M.E.R. They claimed to be the force SHIELD had failed to be. They would destroy threats instead of merely defending from eventual blows. Hal – the untrained girl with a head full of the world's deadliest secrets – seemed the greatest threat of all. So when one of their acolytes in the hospital where she was scheduled for surgery reported her imminent arrival, H.A.M.M.E.R. took advantage.

No one broke into a SHIELD facility. SHIELD had betrayed itself.

Whatever vague morals H.A.M.M.E.R. still claimed must have persuaded a few members to object to just putting a bullet in Hal's head. Instead, she could be their guinea pig. A pair of operatives had recovered one of the older devices Hydra used to 'train' the Winter Soldier. Since Hal's knowledge, rather than her life, presented the threat, H.A.M.M.E.R. decided she would make the perfect test subject.

For a while, they simply kept track of how long it took her memories to coalesce after a treatment.

And then they discovered the true gift of her mutation, and they exploited it.

They meant for her to be their Inquisitor. No need for interrogations, where lies flowed as easily as truth. Just sit the subject across from the Inquisitor and wait until viable information surfaced.

So they picked agents with one or two nips of important information, but no one with a high enough rank to draw serious attention, and pulled out answers. They built up their intel, preparing for the day they would replace the broken agency that had birthed them with the greater power of their new command. If they hadn't taken so many agents, Coulson might not have even recognized the pattern.

He dropped his face to his hand and kneaded his eyes. The pain helped him focus and, more importantly, distracted him from the growing headache at the base of his skull.

How had he not seen?

How could SHIELD grown so rotten?

He'd known he had a long path ahead of him when he accepted Fury's offer to become the new Director. But, sometimes, it seemed like the road just kept getting longer. Every advance was met with two more steps to take.

If he stepped outside his office, he knew his team would be there, waiting for orders, waiting to support him.

He couldn't stop thinking about the people who wouldn't be there.

Sergeant Barnes was in the wind – again.

And he'd taken Hal with him.

Coulson was back to square one.

**A/N: Oh, look, I missed my own deadline. Again. Writer's block bites. And almost the entire chapter was Steve's POV, which I have a lot of trouble writing for some reason. I'm just gonna stop guess-timating when the next chapter will be out. You should expect one about once a week, though next week might be late because one of my jobs has rehearsals EVERY FLIPPIN' NIGHT. And I maybe have an entire costume to build for a convention in the span of a week (WHY DID I PROMISE WINGS?! WHY?!).**

**BRACE FOR AUTHOR'S NOTE OF DOOOOM! FYI, it's, um, 2. In the morning. So this ridiculously long peek into my creative choices mayhap be rather garbled. And I'm too tired to be sorry. You've been warned.**

**First – H.A.M.M.E.R. is an actual villainous organization from the Marvel comics. And it began in the wake of the comics' version of SHIELD's implosion, which involved shape-shifting aliens rather than Hydra. Obviously, I tweaked some things, but this was just too good to pass up.**

**Now for Hal, because some people were pretty floored by her POV. Hal was an experiment. Not an asset. At least not at first. So unlike the Soldier, when the researchers performed 'electroshock therapy,' or some hellish variation thereof, on Hal, they weren't as interested in preserving any particular parts of her brain. Bucky was a sniper well before his days as the Soldier, and Hydra clearly wanted to keep this ability as it factors in the Soldier's skill set. Hal's value came from her memory. H.A.M.M.E.R. went at her with the intent to destroy that. And her brain was already unique, so they would've been liberal to make sure they had all their bases covered. So, in the beginning, in those scenes where I lost a few of you, you were supposed to be lost. Hal's ability to use words in her thoughts at all demonstrates tenacity and incredible powers of recuperation.**

**I've worked with people who suffer brain damage from natural causes. Sometimes they speak complete sentences that make perfect logical sense – only in the wrong situation. Sometimes they speak sentences with correct structures (all the parts of speech are where they should be), but nothing they say makes sense. At all. You just have no idea what they're talking about. Sometimes they don't even have that much. Sometimes you get disassociated words. Sometimes words that aren't words at all. Eventually, many patients lose the ability to speak entirely. I imagine Hal post-treatments as something like a reverse case of Alzheimer's.**

**Because of her mutation, however, her brain isn't just recovering, it's evolving. It is doing two things. First, it is gradually abandoning areas routinely destroyed (eg. hippocampus and entorhinal cortex) and strengthening/developing other areas. Trying to build a firewall to stop the damage spreading. Redesigning itself, repurposing areas and storing info in strange new places. Which is why her POV bits get so confusing. They're her POV, and her brain is like, "Pardon Our Dust." Secondly, she recognizes, on some basic level, that she is in danger. Pretty much all animals call when they're in danger. Typically, they scream. Telepathy is Hal's scream. Since verbal communication has lost its apparent effectiveness, she is developing new ways to call for help. Luckily, her handlers don't realize all that entails, because they aren't her subconscious target. This is also why her POV is more coherent in dreams; that's where her new communication skills are strongest.**

**YOU ARE ALL AWESOME AND I LOVE YOU! ALMOST AS MUCH AS TEA! ALMOST!**

**Replies to Anons:**

**Inkwriter: Thank you so much for the review! I can't say much about any potential romance, because this story keeps evolving in unplanned ways. Right now the only thing that has stayed the same is the fact that Hal got brainwashed. Literally. That's it. I had a whole other route planned involving multiple new mutant OCs, and then things were redirected to what we've got here, and... yeah. I genuinely can't say at this point. Alas. Thankies for your faith in the story, though!**

**Sah: Thank you very, very much, as always! I'm looking forward to writing her recovery, too. She is literally evolving into a new character, and it's a really fun challenge. I feel you on the sleepy thing. I'm listening to hardcore techno and bouncing in my seat so I don't fall asleep right now. 0,0. Wooooo... Thanks again for the review!**

**Adriana: Thank you, thank you! You are just full of compliments, aren't you? I've had so much fun with Empty Hal, and I'm really looking forward to, er, re-developing her as a character. And, yeah, this is gonna be all kinds of fun as far as her relationship with Bucky. Thanks again, and I hope you enjoyed the chapter!**

**Ashley: Thank you very much! I feed your addiction? Well, that review certainly fed my ego. I think this is the start of something beautiful. Thanks again, and I hope you enjoyed the latest fix!**


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